Iranian election

According to final result of Iran's presidential election, fiercely fought by the two main contestants - President Mehmoud Ahmadinejad and Mir-Hossein Mousavi - and keenly observed by the West, the incumbent has won with 63 percent of the vote against 34 percent for Mousavi. The two other challengers trail far behind with just 3 percent of the vote.
Mousavi's supporters have refused to accept the outcome, resorting to violent protest demonstrations in Tehran as well as several other cities. He himself said on Sunday that he had lodged an appeal with the Guardians Council - which supervises the elections - to cancel the result, calling it a "charade." But the Interior Ministry responsible for conducting the electoral exercise has rejected the allegations of fraud. More importantly, the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Khamenei, has called on Iranians to back their president.
It is however significant that he referred Mousavi's letter citing gross irregularities that he wrote to him for consideration of the Council of Guardians, which says it is ready to recount disputed votes from Friday's presidential poll.
The sharp disagreements the election brought to the surface are reflective of a conservative-liberal divide that has existed in Iran right from the beginning of the 1979 Revolution, which was supported by different parties and groups of liberal and progressive persuasion. Mousavi is no liberal. In fact, he was conservative enough to serve as prime minister during the tumultuous years of the Iran-Iraq war soon after the Islamic Revolution. He was the last prime minister in Iran before the constitutional changes which removed the post of prime minister.
Those who yearn for social and political freedoms do not have much of a choice but to rally round pro-reform - no matter how restricted in scope - candidates. Hence they supported the relatively open-minded Mousavi, a painter and an architect, as they had done earlier for the 'reformist' president Mohammad Khatami.
Like election in any other country the ultimate decider proved to be the economic issue. Ahmadinejad's government, awash in windfall profits from the record high oil prices, has been distributing cash among the disadvantaged sections of society, also distributing some of the benefits to the middle classes, including civil servants and pensioners.
And the President himself has lived simply, which was one of the reasons he won in 2005 against the then incumbent Hashemi Rafsanjani, who was moderate on both social issues and Iran's policy towards the West besides being a supporter of market-based economy, but had a taste for ostentation. Ahmadinejad's government is also credited for waging a consistent campaign against corruption.
Ahmadinejad's holocaust denying rhetoric may have irked many inside and outside the country, but Iran under him has played its cards well enough to emerge as an influential regional player. As regards the nuclear issue, there appears to be a general consensus on the present policy. In any case, it is not the prerogative of the president but the Supreme Leader himself.
Western leaders and the media might squirm over his reelection, but they are well aware that Iran's policy toward the West is unlikely to undergo any major change as long as the ruling establishment remains the same.
The manifest frustration of the Iranians who worked and voted for the 'more openness' candidate is understandable. Still, their efforts may not have been entirely wasteful. The challenge they threw Ahmadinejad's way might force him to think about loosening some of the social strictures as well as restrictions on democratic freedoms.