Nikahang Kowsar "Defrosting the Elections" --- His journalist to the Supreme Leader, "Haji, be careful that your beard doesn't get burned!"
0600 GMT: With two days to go before the Parliamentary elections, no one within the regime is projecting which factions --- the Supreme Leader's supporters? President Ahmadinejad's men? a "break-away" conservative bloc? --- among the 3444 candidates and 230 political groups will triumph. To do so would admit to the intense political in-fighting around that campaign.
Instead, the proclamations are about the turnout. Some in the regime have proclaimed that 80% of the electorate will vote, despite calls for a boycott by reformists and the Green Movement; generally, a benchmark of 60% is being put out.
The Tehran Times gives the "objective" assessment:
According to an opinion poll conducted this week, about 37 percent of respondents in Tehran said they would be voting in the election.
Many political analysts say that the results will lead to run-off elections for some of Tehran’s 30 parliamentary seats.
The poll shows a 7 percent increase in the number of potential voters in Tehran in comparison to last week, and it is predicted that the figure will reach 40 percent by Friday, which is election day.
In recent parliamentary elections, the average turnout in Tehran was about 30 percent.
According to a nationwide survey, more than 57 percent of eligible voters will vote in the elections.
This morning, however, another number catches my attention, one connected with the last election. Conservative MP Ali Motahari, who has emerged as a prominent foe of the President and his Government, announced in a debate that up to 50 people died in violence after the 2009 Presidential ballot. Motahari's opponent, Hamid Rasaei, trying to link Motahari to the "sedition current", said that this shameless allegation had also been put out by the BBC, Tehran's #1 enemy amongst the foreign media.
Posted via email from lissping
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