Iranians from every political stripe have taken to FACEBOOK to discuss whether they should vote in this month’s presidential election. There are numerous daily online articles on the subject; it is now a hot dialogue among the Iranian diaspora. Many argue that their vote does not count, that at the end of the day, all four frontrunners–Ahmadi Nejad, Karrubi, Musavi and Rezai—are of the same mold, and that the outcome is clear anyway.
Most Iranians also remember the Khatami era when more than 70 percent of the population voted for him and the result was that very little changed. Therefore, they have come to conclude that no matter what, in the Islamic Republic, their vote doesn’t really count because the structure of the regime stays intact. Is that true? Maybe, maybe not.
The fact that people can go to the polls and cast their vote is a relatively a new thing in Iran. During the Shah’s reign, people did not have a choice, they could not speak out on the question of whether they wanted a dictator or not. Now, some thirty years after the Islamic Revolution, Iranians have come to realize that there is such a thing as voting and in the process, even if the choice is between, the “good”, the bad, and the ugly, they should exercise their one and only right: to vote.
The choice between the four contenders may not be all that great. However, in the last four years of Ahmadi Nejad’s populist reign, things have gone from bad to worse, socially, economically and on the international front. People inside Iran are terribly disillusioned and unhappy; there are more executions, some by stoning; more journalists have been incarcerated; the press is under virtual house arrest; many more papers have been shut down, and more women and student activists are in jail. Another four years of Ahmadi Nejad would be catastrophic for the Iranian society.
The choice now is to vote for someone a little bit better, to lift the spirit of Iranian society which has been held down in the last four years. To buy votes, Ahmadi Nejad uses nice rhetoric, hands down money, gives interest free loans and distributes potatoes! Karubi and Musavi are talking about giving more freedom to people and sharing power with members of the opposition. Whether they would make good on their promise is an other story. But the fact is that the Iranian society cannot tolerate four more years of strangulation under Ahmadi Nejad.
During his 2005 campaign, Ahmadi Nejad presented himsel f as a ‘man of the people” who was determined to fight corruption. He may not be corrupt himself, but he surely has spread corruption around. Some of his own family members are benefiting from the fruit of his pr esidency. Corruption in fact has become rampant under Ahmadi Nejad.
As one Tehran University student put it: “I think we must vote. The Ahmadi Nejad factor is real and dangerous. Many may not believe it or are just looking at Tehran, where he is likely lose. But the reason he won in 2005 was because lots of people voted for him; it was not just the fundamentalists. Like many living in Iran, I believe that we should not let this man be re-elected. Abstention is non-sense. It is as if you play a game of chess with an uneducated boxer. Here the laws of politics have not fully formed to the extent where abstention is meaningful.”
It is true that in Iran, the President doesn’t have the same power as in the US. Yet his power is not insignificant and he is not just a figure head. Most importantly he is the public face of the country to the outside world.
Iranians, both inside and outside of Iran must exercise their only right-to vote- this time en masse, and to make sure that Ahmadi Nejad is not re-elected. Not to vote means a sure victory for Ahmadi Nejad. The international community and Iran as a society cannot afford another four years of a man who has done his part to ruin Iran. The time has come for all of us to oust the little dictator out of office.
