http://www.gulf-times.com/site/topics/article.asp?cu_no=2&item_no=304123&version=1&template_id=37&parent_id=17
Iran leader under fire for VP pick
Publish Date: Monday,20 July, 2009, at 12:13 PM Doha Time
Press TV said Esfandiar Rahim Mashaie "no longer wanted the job" of first
vice president and had resigned because of the row
Reuters/Tehran
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has come under fire from leading
hardliners for naming as his top deputy a man who said Iran was friends with
everyone, including arch-foe Israel, local media said yesterday.
Iran's state-run English language Press TV said Esfandiar Rahim Mashaie "no
longer wanted the job" of first vice president and had resigned because of the
row.
There was no immediate confirmation of the decision.
Analysts say Thursday's decision by Ahmadinejad to appoint Mashaie, to whom he
is related by marriage, suggests that the president has a small entourage of
people he trusts. Ahmadinejad was re-elected in a June 12 presidential vote,
which stirred the largest display of internal unrest in Iran, the world's fifth
biggest oil exporter, since the 1979 Islamic revolution and exposed deep rifts
in its ruling elite.
Defeated pro-reform candidates say the vote was rigged, but the latest
criticism of Ahmadinejad came from conservatives.
In rare public criticism, Ayatollah Ahmed Khatami, an Ahmadinejad ally and
member of Iran's top legislative body, said yesterday that Ahmadinejad had
shown "a twisted face to clerics and elites" by appointing Mashaie last
Thursday. "Ahmadinejad should not challenge conservatives with such decisions.
I request the president to replace him before more criticisms are made," the
hardline cleric was quoted as saying by the Khorasan newspaper. Mashaie, whose
remarks on Israel in 2008 created a storm at home, was previously one of
several vice presidents and in charge of a culture and tourism body.
There are still many hardliners who back the president, such as Ayatollah
Mohamed Yazdi, who said in remarks published on Saturday that the Iranian
government drew its legitimacy from "the Almighty God". Many hardline lawmakers
and clerics, including several top clerics, had called on the president to
dismiss Mashaie for his Israel comments. Ahmadinejad remained defiant, saying
Mashaie's remarks had been "misrepresented". The row over Mashaie last year
ended after Iran's most powerful figure Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei,
who backs Ahmadinejad, said in September the remarks "are not right but the
dispute should end".
A hardline editor seen as close to Iran's top authority also criticised
Ahmadinejad's choice of the first vice president, which unlike ministers does
not need approval of parliament. "Ahmadinejad's appointment of Mashaie as his
first vice president brought shock, regret and concern to his voters," said
Hossein Shariatmadari, the editor-in-chief of the hardline Kayhan daily. "It is
necessary for Ahmadinejad to take back the first vice presidency from Mashaie,"
Shariatmadari wrote in the daily. Mashaie also came under fire for hosting a
ceremony in November where women in traditional dress carried in the Qur'an to
music, an action deemed insulting to the holy book.
Lawmaker Hamid Rasai said Iranian society was very sensitive over Mashaie. "I
believe it would have been better if he had not been appointed," the Etemad-e
Melli newspaper quoted Rasai, an ally of Ahmadinejad, as saying. A pro-reform
lawmaker said Ahmadinejad could be impeached over his decision. "Now lawmakers
can question Ahmadinejad or even impeach him for this appointment," the
newspaper quoted Dariush Ghanbari as saying. Analysts say Ahmadinejad's
impeachment is unlikely, as parliament is dominated by hardliners.
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