KHATAMI'S BLUNT WARNING TO MONOPOLISTS: NO ARTIFICIAL REGIME LAST LONG
By Safa Haeri
TEHRAN-PARIS 29th APR. (IPS) - The ayatollah Mohammad Khatami of Iran described Thursday the present Islamic system of Iran as "superficial" and warned against the creation of artificial systems that would never last long.
Observers said since he became president two years ago, that was the first time the ayatollah Mohammad Khatami was speaking so clearly about his perception of the velayat faqih, or the rule of tutor, which is the basic principle of the Iranian system.
Inaugurating Tehran's first elected city council, President Khatami said "by considering people as minors and by elevating oneself as their tutor, one creates an artificial system that will not last long", he told the newly elected council, all 15 members reformists and among his followers.
The inauguration of the Tehran's city Council by the president and with a message from the leader, the ayatollah Ali Khameneh'i, who urged the members to withhold the principles and values of Islam and revolution was a hard hitting slap for the conservative-controlled Supervisory Board that, earlier in the week, had disqualified 5 important members of the council.
All the five invalidated men, that are the hojatoleslam Abdollah Nouri, the former Interior Minister, Mr. Sa'id Hajjarian, the Editor of the influential daily "Sobh Emrooz", Mohammad Ebrahim Asqarzadeh, a students leader, Mr. Ahmad Hakimipour and Mr. Mohammad Atrianfar, the Editor of "Hamshahri" daily were elected as chairman, vice-chairman, secretaries and commissioner of the council.
"The victory of Mr. Nouri is that of the entire people over the zealots and the monopolists that, in the past years, have all the time challenged people's rights and expectations, challenged the president and his reforms by first impeaching Mr. Nouri when he was Interior Minister and now impeaching Mr. Mohajerani, another heavy weight Minister", observed Mr. Mohammad Sadeq Javadi-Hesar, a prominent liberal journalist based in the north eastern city of Mash-had.
By inaugurating the city and village councils, the first in the contemporary history of Iran, Mr. Khatami was fulfilling a major promise he had pledged during his electoral campaign two years ago.
The inaugural ceremonies took place in a small wood-panelled hall next to the main city office building in central Tehran and with the presence of a small assembly of ministers, some MPs and senior clerics.
About 280,000 candidates of both sexes, much less than the number expected by the government competed for 130,000 council seats.
Insisting on the importance of implementing freedoms, Mr. Khatami said one has to provide freedom to the people so they can choose freely their destiny. "The people have taken a decisive step towards freedom and national pride. We are witnessing one of the most evident manifestations of people's control over their own destiny," Khatami told the floor.
Describing the councils as "the symbol of national unity", Mr. Khatami said that different views, tastes and ideas must live together, in harmony and understanding of each other. "There is also this other unity that is after imposing one ideology, one idea, one taste, one way of thinking, one way of life to the whole of the populations and considers itself as the righteous. But such unity is not accepted by Islam, wise men nor us", he said, singling out the hard liners that opposes his reforms, chief among them Mr. Khameneh'i.
In a direct challenge to the conservative establishment that has put up obstacles to his reform programme, pointed out that "the worse kind" of imposing oneself on others was abusing the people's believes under the name of Islam, Ashoura, clericaldom, leadership aimed at booting out the rival from the arena.
In a blunt warning to his opponents, he reminded that his government was the fruit of the landslide victory the people brought to him. "In the last presidential election each side said what it really meant. Therefore, one can not say people's massive vote was accidental", he said, pledging once again that he would go ahead with his promised reforms using "all the means and powers" he disposes of.
Absent from the ceremony was Mr. Qolamhosein Karbaschi, the suspended Mayor of Tehran who played a vital role in the victory of Mr. Khatami over his main rival, the ayatollah Ali Akbar Nateq Nouri, the Speaker of the Majles, who was then backed by the entire conservative establishment, including the leader.
Though convinced on charges of graft and abuse of power, nevertheless, for many Iranians, Mr. Karbaschi pays the price of both services he provided to the candidate Khatami and his loyalty to President Khatami.
If not pardoned by the leader, Mr. Karbaschi, one of the very few able directors and entrepreneurs in cadre-short Islamic Iran will have to serve 2 years jail term followed by ten years of total ban from public activity.
Islamic Republic's official news agency IRNA said Karbaschi has been given one week to report to prison to begin serving his sentence. But some informed sources hopes that his real mentor, the former president ayatollah Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani who brought him from Isfahan to Tehran will persuade Mr. Khameneh'i to pardon him.
The imprisonment of Mr. Karbaschi, the secretary-general of the Servants of Reconstruction Party (SRP) will be a very hard blow to that political formation that is also the right wing in Mr. Khatami's coalition government, as two other leading and influential members of the SRP in Mrs Fa'ezeh Hashemi, the outspoken MP of Tehran, owner of the suspended newspaper Zan (Woman) and daughter of Mr. Hahsemi Rafsanjani and Mr. Mohajerani, the Guidance Minister are more or less disabled by the conservatives.
Hence the appointment of Tehran's mayor, a choice which takes on special importance with the arrest order served to Mr. Karbaschi as one of the councils most important tasks to resolve.
Some analysts see Mr. Nouri as the new Mayor. But the job may also go to Mr. Ata'ollah Mohajerani, the Islamic Guidance Minister who faces a motion of impeachment in the Majles. If impeached, Mr. Khatami may offer him the job instead of Mr. Nouri. ENDS CONFRONTATION 2949900