EXPERTS CRITICISED FOR THEIR ALLEGIANCE TO THE LEADER
TEHRAN-PARIS 15TH Jan. (IPS) Two prominent Iranian political analysts strongly criticised the statement issued Thursday by the Assembly of Experts saying contesting the principle of religious leadership (velayat faqih) was against Islam and constitution.
"Every guideline of the supreme leader of the Islamic revolution, ayatollah Ali Khameneh'i should be regarded as the final solution to any dispute emerging in the society", the official news agency IRNA quoted the statement of the conservatives-controlled Assembly.
"Obedience to the guide is one of the religious duties our people must commit themselves to following," the statement added.
The final communiqué released by Assembly of Experts at the end of it's three days session held in the city of Qom also called on Iranians to take part "massively" at the forthcoming Majles (parliament) elections due next February in the one hand and stressed that the controversial concept of velayat faqih (religious leadership) was the "fundamental" principle of the Islamic Republic.
The role of the 86-members Assembly of Experts, regarded as both the most powerful and yet the least active of all the nation's institutions, is to elect a new leader when one dies or is incapacitated in the one hand and to supervise the actions of the leader on the other.
"It is interesting to note that the statement talks more about the elections instead of concentrating on the actions of the leader and in this respect, it looks more like a statement issued by a political party that expresses its views concerning the elections, a position that, anyhow, is very far from that of the people", observed Mr. Ahmad Salamatian, a former MP who lives and works in Paris.
"The Experts say in their statement that the government must do its best to ensure that the best of candidates, meaning those who supports the velayate faqih get to the Majles, ignoring that this is the duty of the people, not the authorities, to elect their candidates freely and send them to the parliament", he added during an interview with the Persian service of the BBC.
Noting that the Constitution says clearly that the main or the only duty of the Assembly of Experts was to elected a new leader after the death of a former one but particularly to supervise the deeds and actions of the leader, Mr. Salamatian observed that not only the Experts do not respond to their duty, but confirms its own allegiance to the leader.
"The problem that is being discussed now (in Iran) is that the Experts do not act according to their assignment and mission that is to supervise the work of the leader, not to order the people to obey and follow him", he further added.
Both he and hojatoleslam Hasan Yusefi-Eshkevari of the Shari'ati Cultural Centre in Tehran criticised the Experts of not being more attentive to the wishes and the orders of the leader instead of their constituencies, saying that this situation had it's roots in the fact that the Council of the Guardians wets only those candidates who are more in line with the leadership.
"In this way, the Assembly of Experts instead of supervising the leader, has in fact become an appendix to the leadership", Mr. Salamatian pointed out.
Recalling that the Experts belong in their great majority to the orthodoxes who have "serious difficulties with democracy and nationalism", the outspoken Yusefi-Eshkevari said the conservatives do not want accept democracy, freedoms, separation of the powers and the republicanism recognised by the Constitution but at the same time they want to put on a mask by accepting elections in which, thanks to the exceptional rights reserved for the Council of Guardians, only candidates who are in line with them are wetted, making the elections a farce.
The problem is that more than ever, the concept of velayat faqih, or the rule of a supreme leader is hotly contested in Iran, mostly by students who wants the leader not to stand above laws, his function be clearly defined and he also be answerable to the people, through different institutions like the Assembly of Experts.
"In the past two years, more criticism is voiced concerning the position of the leader as there is one school of thinking that places the leader above all laws while another one accept the concept of velayat but provided it be obedient to laws and Constitution", Mr. Yusefi-Eshkevari said.
Not only the leadership, mostly the present one that is represented by the lamed ayatollah Khameneh'i, but almost all institutions under his control, the revolutionary guards, the Council of Guardians, the Security services, the Radio and Television, the Judiciary etc are also bitterly criticised by the reformists who fear that the Guardians would eliminate most their candidates for the sixth Majles.
In the view of hojatoleslam Yusefi-Eshkevari, this explain why the experts had reaffirmed obedience to the leader, warned against any action that weakens the leadership, saying hesitation about the sacred principle of velayat faqih was against Islam and the constitution. ENDS EXPERTS ASSEMBLY 15100