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The Iranian presidential election of 2005, the ninth presidential election in Iran ian history, took place in two rounds, first on June 17 , 2005 , and then as a run-off on June 24 . It led to the victory of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad , the hardline mayor of Tehran , with 19.48% of the votes in the first round and 61.69% in the second. Ahmadinejad is believed to have won the second round because of his populist views, especially those regarding the poor people and their economic status. The election saw a turnout of almost 60% of eligible voters, seen as a strike back by Iran at the United States' initial allegations that many in Iran would be restricted from voting. Mohammad Khatami , the previous President Of Iran , had stepped down on August 2 , 2005 , after serving his maximal two consecutive four-year terms according to the Islamic Republic's Constitution . The first round of the election was a very close race with minor differences in the number of votes won by each candidate which led to a run-off a week later with Ahmadinejad and ex-president Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani participating. There were seven people running for the post out of more than a thousand initial candidates, most of whom were disqualified by the Guardian Council , which holds veto power over all political candidates in Iran. Rafsanjani, who had been regarded as the front-runner and had positioned himself as a centrist, was defeated by Ahmadinejad in the run-off, while reformist candidate Mostafa Moeen fared poorly and finished only fifth in the first round. This was the first presidential runoff in the history of Iran. Before the run-off took place, it was compared to the 2002 French Presidential Election , where the splintering of the left-wing vote similarly led to a run-off between the moderate Jacques Chirac and the Far-right Jean-Marie Le Pen . The comparison was made because of the unexpected votes of Ahmadinejad, the very close race, and the comparability of the political standings of Rafsanjani and Ahmadinejad to those of Chirac and Le Pen. But after the results for the run-off is out, the comparison is considered void because of the higher standing of Ahmadinejad and the inability of his opponents to form a majority alliance against him. RESULTS While pre-voting polls mostly favored a run-off between Rafsanjani and Mostafa Moeen, the actual vote counts from the Ministry of Interior unexpectedly put Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Mehdi Karroubi in second and third places. Rafsanjani and Ahmadinejad led with respectively 21.0% and 19.5% of the votes, and were followed by Karroubi (17.3%), Ghalibaf (13.9%), Moeen (13.8%), Larijani (5.9%), and Mehralizadeh (4.4%) {Link without Title} . This was the result of 29,317,042 votes, which amounts to a turnout of 62.66%, as there were 46,786,418 eligible voters. While Rafsanjani had secured the first place in the first round, he failed to win the second round, by failing to attract the people who have voted for the reformist candidates who were now supporting him in the second round, like Karroubi and Moeen. Ahmadinejad won with 61.7% of the votes, while Rafsanjani only secured 35.9%. There was a total of 27,959,253 votes in the secoud round, slightly lower than the first round. Considering that the number of eligible votes was raised by about 150,000 people, the turnout was about 59.6%. The tabulated results follow: ELECTION CONTROVERSIES After the first round of the election, some people, including , a few reformist morning newspapers, '' Eghbal '', '' Hayat-e No '', '' Aftab-e Yazd '', and '' Etemad '' were stopped from distribution by the general prosecutor of Tehran, Saeed Mortazavi , for publishing Karroubi's letter. Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani , the leading candidate, has also pointed to organized and unjust interventions by "guiding" the votes, and has supported Karroubi's complaint {Link without Title} . Also, some political groups, including the reformist party '' has pointed to an announcement by Movahhedi Kermani, the official representative of the supreme leader in Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, mentioning "vote for a person who keeps to the minimum in his advertisements and doesn't lavish", which uniquely pointed to Ahmadinejad. {Link without Title} Many of the controversies include the Guardian Council in the illegal activities, including it publishing an opinion poll before the election putting Ahmadinejad as the front-runner against all other opinion polls, and it announcing the partial results of the election on the day after the election, putting Ahmadinejad on the second rank while he was still in the third rank in the partial statistics published by the Ministry of Interior, which led to President Khatami going to the Ministry several times and explicitly asking the Council to not announce any more partial results. TURNOUT AND BOYCOTTS The Islamic Republic government of Iran, especially the Supreme Leader and the higher offices, publicly considers the Turnout of the voters, which was about 63% in the first round, to resemble the support of the population for the regime, while some voters consider voting for the candidates less aligned with the supreme leader as a vote against the current practices of the regime. Also, some voters, including exiled citizens belonging to opposition political groups or Monarchist s (both living outside Iran), some parts of the intellectual community living in Iran, and even a few Reformist s, had Boycott ed the election as a symbol of not supporting the current regime and its practices. The boycotters' reasons included the massive rejection of registered candidates, that they believed that the role of the Iranian president is insignificant in the power structure and overshadowed by those of the supreme leader who is practically elected for life, and that they believed that all the candidates had already helped the regime in the oppression of its political opposition or would do so if elected. The most famous boycott leader was Akbar Ganji , imprisoned in Evin Prison for his journalism and in a Hunger Strike . While some members of the intellectual community in Iran supported the boycott, some key figures, residing inside Iran or exiled to Europe or North America, had asked their readers and the general population to vote in the election, reasoning that not voting in the election would result in the election of one of the three conservative candidates, who were all Military people with a background in Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps . The most famous supporters of voting in the intellectual community included Ebrahim Nabavi , Masoud Behnoud , and Khashayar Deyhimi . These people were mostly supporting Moeen as their preferred candidate who is considered to be the least aligned with Ayatollah Khamenei, but a few have also talked or written in support of Rafsanjani or Karroubi . After the results of the first round, many of the supporters of the boycott are now supporting Hashemi Rafsanjani, and many of the supporters of the reformist candidates, including many supporters of Moeen, are doing the same. Islamic Iran Participation Front (IIPF) and Mojahedin Of The Islamic Revolution Organization (MIRO), as the two main parties who supported Moeen, are included, with IIPF asking for "uniting against the rise of religious Fascism " and MIRO telling about the rival "'' Führer ''-istic mindset" {Link without Title} . Moeen himself has mentioned that he will not personaly vote in the second round, but that his supporters "should take the danger of fascism seriously" and should not think about a boycott in the second round. Also, Emadeddin Baghi , the President of the Iranian Association for Supporting Prisoners' Rights and one of the boycotters, has also spoken in support of Rafsanjani and mentioned that while he still considers Rafsanjani a conservative, he prefers his traditional conservatism to Ahmadinezhad's fundamentalism. SCHEDULE The schedule of the election had been decided between the Ministry of Interior and the Guardian Council for June 17 , 2004 . The election will continue as a runoff race, which will take place a week later than the first round of elections, on June 24 , 2005 . The registration of candidates began on May 10 , 2005 and continued for five days, until May 14 . If the Guardian Council had requested, it may have been extended for five more days, until May 19 . The candidates were not allowed to do advertisements, until the final list of approved candidates are known. The official period for advertisement was May 27 to June 15 . In the first round, Iranian nationals born on or before , Garmsar , Ghazvin , Ilam , Iranshahr , Jolfa , Marand , Sarbaz , and Shiraz took place together with the runoff elections of Tehran for the Iranian Majlis Election Of 2004 . The first three suggestions by the Ministry, for May 13 , May 20 , and June 10 , 2005 , had been rejected by the Council. The Ministry had mentioned that it is concerned that an election later than May 20 may collide with the final exams of the elementary schools and high schools. The second round of the election will happen on June 24 , and Iranian nationals born on or before June 24 , 1990 will be able to vote. The election in Iran will begin on 09:00 local time (04:30 UTC) and the closing time of the voting polls will be at 19:00 (14:30 UTC), but may be extended by the Ministry of Interior. CANDIDATES The registration of the candidates finished on May 14 , 2005 and 1014 candidates had registered to run, including many people who didn't have the qualifications required in the law. More than 90% of the candidates were men, and there were about ninety female candidates. The law about the election process does not include any requirements for people who want to register to run: it only provides qualifications that are to be checked by the Guardian Council. The candidates must have first be approved by the Guardian Council before being put to public vote and it could be predicted that some of the candidates would not win the approval, especially Ebrahim Asgharzadeh and Ebrahim Yazdi , who were rejected by the Council in the Parliamentary Elections Of 2004 and/or the Presidential Elections Of 2001 . There were also some people who expected Mostafa Moeen , the most controversial reformist candidate, to be disqualified as well. But the most unpredictable was the disqualification of conservative Reza Zavare'i , a former member of the Guardian Council and an approved presidential candidate for two previous elections. Also, there was a high probability of rejection of women, because of an ambiguous term ("''rejāl''", رجال) in the Constitution Of Iran , a requirement for presidential candidates, which may be interpreted as either "men" or "famous people". The Guardian Council, who is also the official interpreter of the constitution, has mentioned on previous elections that the restriction has not been considered in depth yet, since according to the Council's opinion there were no women registered to run for presidency who fulfilled the other requirements of the constitution; but still, the Council believes that the requirement of ''rejaal'' would not match women. There had also been discussions for a new law proposed in the Majlis , restricting the maximum age of the candidates for the presidential elections. This was widely seen as an attempt to limit the participation of Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani and Mehdi Karroubi . The attempt failed with no proposal appearing. Approved candidates The list of all the people who have officially registered to run for the post is not available to the public, but the Guardian Council published a final list of six approved candidates on , the Guardian Council announced the approval of Moeen and Mehralizadeh. Mohsen Rezaee , one of the approved conservative candidates, who is the Secretary of Expediency Discernment Council and a previous commander of the Iran-Iraq War , withdrew in the evening of June 15 . These are the candidates approved by the Council of Guardians: Trans-party
Reformists
Conservative s
Rejected candidates
Declinations and withdrawals The most important withdrawal was that of Mohsen Rezaee , one of the candidates who was approved by the Guardian Council and participated in the race until the evening of June 15 , 2005 , two days before the election and only a few hours before the final deadline allowed for advertisements. Rezaee mentioned he is withdrawing from the race for "the integraton of the votes of the nation" and "their effectiveness". He did not endorse any candidate. {Link without Title} Also, several people were considered possible candidates for the post, who later declined to run early in the race or at the final moments before registration. A list of the ones considered seriously in the media includes:
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