Iranian presidential candidates vied on Wednesday to win over the youth vote, promising less interference by religious police in their daily lives and better social, cultural and employment opportunities. The youth vote will be a major battleground in the June 17 presidential race with half of Iran's disproportionately youthful population under the age of 25 and a minimum voting age of 15.
Young Iranians voted en masse in 1997 and 2001 to elect reformist cleric Mohammad Khatami, who is ineligible to stand for a third consecutive term.
But many have grown disenchanted after Khatami's failure to overhaul Islamic rules governing censorship and mingling between the sexes, reverse Iran's political isolation from the West and transform the inefficient, state-run economy.
Eager to harness this support, most of the eight candidates have used campaign messages to try to appeal to the young. "Young people are our assets ... we cannot expect their high performance while limiting their freedoms," said front-runner Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, a moderate conservative who is bidding to regain the post he held from 1989 to 1997.
Former parliament speaker Mehdi Karroubi, a reformist cleric, pledged to safeguard people's rights. "When people are not informed of their rights, the ground is prepared for ... people to violate others' rights and freedom," he said.
Even hard-liner Mohsen Rezaie, who commanded Iran's feared Revolutionary Guards from 1981 to 1997, said people have the right to behave as they want in private. "I am against state interference in people's private lives," he told Reuters. "I want to institutionalise freedoms and democracy in the country."
Carloads of young Iranians snaked through streets in upscale north Tehran in support of Rafsanjani on Tuesday and Wednesday.
Their cars plastered with posters of the smiling cleric, young boys in cut-off T-shirts and girls wearing bright make-up and sunglasses flashed victory signs and bobbed to throbbing dance music in violation of strict Islamic moral codes.
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