By Safa Haeri, IPS Editor

TEHRAN 21 Jan. (IPS) An angry ayatollah Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani lashed out Friday at his critics, mostly pro-president Khatami reformists, accusing them of doing the odd, dirty jobs of enemies of Islam and the Islamic revolution".

Speaking from the tribune of the Friday priers at the Tehran University, the former president who is running for the presidency of the next Majles (parliament) defended his achievements both during the war time and the eight years of his controversial presidency, saying those who now criticise his actions are "a group of people, some knowingly, some unknowingly, and some pure agents intended to carry out foreigners schemes in Iran".

"Mr Rafsanjani is cut out from today's Iran realities and does not understand the evolution of the situation in the past two years"observed Mr. Ahmad Zeidabadi, a reformist journalist, commenting Mr. Rafsanjani's speech.

Shooting back at his critics, Mr, Rafsanjani asked, "What is the purpose of the people who are trying to look down on the brilliant accomplishments of Islamic revolution? What is the purpose of those who are trying to suggest that people's participation on the political scene is starting only today? What with certain people who are trying to close their eyes on the elections, on the rallies of the people and on their strikes that pushed the Islamic revolution to its triumph?".

"By participation, the former president understands mass participation of the people during the early days of revolution, the (state-organised) marches, the mobilisation of the nation while the participation after the second of Khordad (elections of hojatoleslam Mohammad Khatami) means instituasition of tools of the State, the importance of the voice and the vote of the people, a government that responds to the demands of the people", Mr. Ahmad Zeidabadi, a reformist journalist in Tehran pointed out in a telephone interview with the Persian section of the Radio France Internationale.

"Since he must be very busy, Mr. Rafsanjani does not realises that there are differences between problems facing a civil society and it's characteristics with the society of the masses, hence his anger why the question of participation is debated as it was something new", he added.

In his lengthy speech that would please both the ayatollah Ali Khameneh'i and the conservatives who are backing his candidacy, Mr. Rafsanjani made frequent use of words and phrases cherished by the leader of the Islamic regime in denouncing the reformists, labelling them "hands of the enemies".

"Those who try to question everything, our development plans, our success, out victories, those who not only question the eight years of sacred was (against Iraq) but even make a joke of it, those who try to separate people from Islam and Koran, those who try to defend the separation of the state from religion and demoralise the people are traitors. This is a big, big treason", Mr. Rafsanjani told worshipers.

He was indirectly reacting to articles in "Asre Azadegan" daily discussing late post revolution Premier Mehdi Bazargan views on the issue of the separation of religion from the government in the one hand and critics published in "Sobhe Emrouz" newspaper where Mr. Akbar Ganji, a leading columnist and investigative journalist would consider Mr. Rafsanjani responsible for the hundreds of thousands of Iranians killed in the war after the capture of Khorramshahr by advancing Iranian forces on the other.

According to Mr. Ganji, it was Mr Rafsanjani, then in charge of the war, who encouraged ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini to continue the operations after the Iranian forces had liberated Khorramshahr.

As a result of that historic victory and the advance of Iranian forces inside Iraq, Saddam Hussein called for cease-fire and Arab states that had sided with Iraq offered between 50 to 100 billions US Dollars of damages to Iran, but the decision to continue the war to "Karbala, Baghdad and Jerusalem" ended in a defeat for Iran.

The suggestion is new as until now, the public's general view was that it was Mr. Khomeini who, on advise from the revolutionary guards but against the opinion of army officers, ordered Iranian forces to push the war until the whole of Iraq is occupied.

Defending forcefully the "economic developments" introduced by him the "prosperity" be offered the nation, the head of the Expediency Council told Iranians "whatever you eat now or you have at home are home-made, from cheese to refrigerators. Before (me), we used to import everything. Today, we are exporters. Even Europeans are complaining that we are dumping our steel because we produce better and cheaper. We built at least 60 dams, making us the world's third dam builder nation and look at what they pretend, that our dams are filled with holes, washed away".

"Directly, Mr. Rafsanjani does not attack his successor, but in fact the essence of his speech was against Mr. Khatami as he does not understand what is questioned is not the development programmes, but the fact that his government was not answerable to the people, that it lacked transparency, that it encouraged nepotism instead of competence", Mr. Zeidabadi observed.

Mr. Hashemi Rafsanjani also criticised religious extremists, saying they too were inflicting damage on Islam, on progress and the prosperity of the nation.

As Mr. Rafsanjani's Friday address was reproduced at length by both the Radio and Television, both media being controlled directly by the leader who appoints the general director of the Radio and Television Organisation, analysts said this is likely to become another hot issue with the former president's opponents since he is the only among all candidates to the next Majles to enjoy full access to public media.

In using to freely and frequently the public media and controlled, thinking of himself that he is no ordinary candidate, Mr. Rafdanjani must remember what happened to poor Nateq-Nouri", said one analyst, referring to the humiliating defeat of the present Speaker during the presidential election of 1997, when a hojatoleslam Ali Akbar Nateq-Nouri as the candidate of the conservatives backed by Mr. Khameneh'i with full access to Radio and Television was nevertheless crushed by his relatively unknown rival named Mohammad Khatami.

"Mr. Rafsanjani's remarks not only does not satisfy the reformists but also would give them more fuel to mount more precise and pin-pointed attacks on him in the coming days, questioning not only the results of eight year of bad presidency, but also his actions before, particularly when he was in charge of war operations. The first salvo are already fired by Mr. Ganji", one analyst observed. ENDS RAFSANJANI 21100