According to Findjobdescriptions, the electoral campaign for the 2009 presidential elections lasts more or less a month and a half, from the beginning of May to 12 June. In that short period of time, Iran experiences some phenomena unprecedented in the history of its electoral competitions. There are four candidates: Ahmadinejad, who asks for confirmation for a second term; Mir Hossein Mousavi, who, after 20 years of private life, returns to politics and runs alongside the moderate wing of the reformists with the blessing and support of the gray eminence of the regime, Hashemi Rafsanjani, and the former reformist president Khatami ; then Mehdi Karrubi, former president of the Majlis, the Parliament, sided with the reformists; finally Mohssen Rezai, former commander of the Pasdaran corps, on which the conservatives, critical of Ahmadinejad’s management, place their hopes of success.
From the early stages of the election campaign, the country realizes that the real battle is between Ahmadinejad and Mousavi. The two, breaking the previous electoral habits, confront each other harshly in the televised debates, during which all the issues on the political agenda – from economic to social policy, from the nuclear question to foreign policy – are discussed and he understands that the two candidates, while remaining within the confines of the regime’s basic rules and positions, have two diametrically opposed views on what Iran should be in the next four years.
The first, Ahmadinejad, insists on his populism, defending the interests of the poor masses, even if in the course of his government he has not been able to keep the promises made in the previous election campaign (inflation is officially around 25%, the unemployment, according to official statistics, is at 30%). As regards foreign and nuclear policy, Ahmadinejad suggests that, if there were dialogue and a prospect of negotiation, as the administration of Barack Obama assumed, only he would be able to manage them in the national interest, without yielding and without selling the country cheaply to the foreigner, as the reformists would do.
The second, Mousavi, instead focuses on the dangers of the isolation in which the country lived during Ahmadinejad’s government and establishes a link between a moderate foreign policy, dialogue on nuclear power and the possibility of overcoming the serious economic crisis that afflicts the country.: dialogue, openness to the outside and moderation – says Mousavi – would lead to the lifting of the sanctions imposed, would improve the living conditions of the popular masses and, above all, would remove the dangers and threats of war generated by the adventurous positions of the Ahmadinejad’s government.
But the news also concern the external aspects of the electoral campaign of candidate Mousavi: during his speeches his wife, Zahra Rahnavard, follows him everywhere, who in turn actively intervenes in defense of the rights of women, culture and art, dragging great masses of young people behind the slogans launched by her husband. The presence of candidate Mousavi’s wife on the political scene, compared with the complete absence of the spouses of all Iranian leaders, irritates the conservatives, but is welcomed with great enthusiasm by young people, women, civil society and gives a sign of change and of modernity to the electoral competition. Then, there is the color green, the other novelty in Mousavi’s election campaign: thousands and thousands of young, old, women and men wear green, they wear a green ribbon on their arms, paint their faces green and cover the buildings with green flags. Mousavi explains that green is the color of nature, of the Islamic religion and, together with white and red, is the color of the national flag. The green movement was born and the Iran of young people, two thirds of the population, who have not yet passed the age of 30, adheres to it with particular fervor, while the press close to Ahmadinejad sees in that movement something similar to what was born in the countries of the East after the fall of communism, the orange movement, and accuses Mousavi of wanting to provoke a sort of velvet revolution in Iran too, perhaps with the help of the Americans. of the Islamic religion and, together with white and red, is the color of the national flag. The green movement was born and the Iran of young people, two thirds of the population, who have not yet passed the age of 30, adheres to it with particular fervor, while the press close to Ahmadinejad sees in that movement something similar to what was born in the countries of the East after the fall of communism, the orange movement, and accuses Mousavi of wanting to provoke a sort of velvet revolution in Iran too, perhaps with the help of the Americans. of the Islamic religion and, together with white and red, is the color of the national flag. The green movement was born and the Iran of young people, two thirds of the population, who have not yet passed the age of 30, adheres to it with particular fervor, while the press close to Ahmadinejad sees in that movement something similar to what was born in the countries of the East after the fall of communism, the orange movement, and accuses Mousavi of wanting to provoke a sort of velvet revolution in Iran too, perhaps with the help of the Americans.
