By Serge Michel

TEHRAN 11^TH Feb. (IPS) In an article published by the French moderate daily "Le Figaro", Mr. Serge Michel, a free lance journalist based in the Iranian capital says the 18^th February elections could bring surprises, including that of a defeat by ayatollah Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani "similar to that of the presidential elections of May 1997 when the candidate of the ruling conservatives hojatoleslam Ali Akbar Nateq Nouri was swept by a relatively unknown rival named Mohammad Khatami.

Here are large excerpts of the article:

"Those who calls him Janus says he has two visages. But Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani has so many other nicknames that may give him even more visages. Which one is the real one? This question dominates the electoral campaign in Iran where the former president is attempting his great return. A Tehran candidate for the 18^th February elections, Mr. Rafsanjani is aiming at the important post of the Speaker of the Parliament.

Out of his nicknames, the most common one is that of "Kuseh", (beardless), to say that this 66 years old cleric has no beard. Other inconvenience is that he wears a white turban while many other Iranian clergymen have a black one that is reserved to the lineage of the prophet. This nevertheless did not prevent him from making a staggering carrier in the Islamic regime. An impeccable revolutionary, a close friend of ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini who was his teacher, he served as Speaker of the Parliament for eight years before becoming president until 23 of May 1997 that saw the victory of Mr. Mohammad Khatami. Since then, he is the Chairman of the Council of Discernment of the State's Interests, an arbitration board where he can exercise happily his passion for secret power.

"Hence his second nickname of "Kuseh" that in Persian means also Shark. No politician in Iran possesses his networks: an immense spider's web the spread from his hometown of Kerman to theological schools of Qom and from the barracks of the revolutionary guards to the skyscrapers of the business community. For the man is also rich. He is reported to be the master of a large industrial empire that includes car production to the export of pistachios. An American magazine ranked him recently as the 49^th fortune in the world.

"That is why his adversaries calls him "Akbar Shah", or King Akbar. In fact, Rafsanjani is already a dynasty: His daughter Fa'ezeh, a dynamic feminist who is promoting women's sport and the wearing of jeans under the chador. There is his son Mohsen, the director of his cabinet who helps him compiling his memories and runs occasionally the never finishing Tehran's Metro project. Fatemeh, another daughter who is less known has just launched a political party while tow other sons, Mehdi and Yaser remains on the touch-line. "Those are jokers he would play them when the time come", says Mohammad Koushani, a young man admitted recently is the restricted club of Iranian journalists who dare to criticise Rafsanjani.

"His article was entitled A Familiy In The Form Of Political Party, telling who the Rafsanjani clan dominated the Reconstruction Servants Party that was created in 1995 by people close to the former president. "Now, this party is cut in two. In one side stand the Rafsanjani family and their cousin Mar'ashi, all more reactionaries than the other side that is occupied by progressists like Qolamhossein Karbaschi (former Mayor of Tehran) or Ata'ollah Mohajerani, the Guidance Minister, says the journalist.

Rafsanjani's last nickname is "The Red Dress Eminence" given to him by Mr. Akbar Ganji, one of the brains of the leftist reformist considered also as the most virulent critics of Mr. Rafsanjani. In a series of unprecedented articles, Ganji has blamed the former president his so-called economic liberalisation of the nineties that created a sytem of generalised prebends as well as the assassination of political and intellectual dissidents during and after his reign.

Though the murders are attributed to Mr. Sa'id Emami, a former Deputy Intelligence Minister who died in prison last July, his boss, hojatoleslam Ali Fallahian has never been disowned by Mr. Rafsanjani. And even on the issue of the Iran-Iraq War where Mr. Rafsanjani has the reputation of having offered the cup of poison to ayatollah Khomeini in order to accept the cease-fire, now Ganji, basing himself on unpublished memoirs of the son of Mr. Khomeini accuses Rafsanjani for having continued the war after Iran liberated Khorramshahr in 1982.

Likewise, criticism of the man who wants to present himself as the father of the nation are pouring since spring of 1999, tending to show that Rafsanjani's political decline has started. "Politic in Iran is now an open game", observes an analyst, pointing out that his secretive style is old-fashioned.

However, as the campaign starts, it looks like that one has buried the man too quickly. Fascinating as he can rebound, Mr. Rafsanjani's name is on the lists of both camps that are at each other throat. By insisting continuously, the conservatives ended to put his name on top of the lists of their candidates, considering him the man who could limit their defeat.

"In the reformist camp, things are less clear. Of the dozen groups and parties that form the 2 Khordad, or 23 May Front, some, like the Islamic Iran Participation Party of Dr Mohammad Reza Khatami, the brother of the President, have refused categorically to take Rafsanjani on their lists.

"This man is a weather vane. He will go according to the wind, that means to the openness", observes a centrist candidate speaking of Rafsanjani who think it is wiser to smile at a man who is supposed to become the next Speaker…. Unless, -- and this is exactly here that the eyes of many Iranians met in the streets or in the shared taxis wide opens -- Rafsanjani is dealt the same fate as that suffered by Ali Akbar Nateq Nouri, the favourite candidate of the conservatives who was swept in the presidential race of May 1997 by an unknown name Mohammad Khatami. ENDS RAFSANJANI LE FIGARO 11200