Turnout in Iran’s Parliamentary Elections Was Below 43%; Lowest Participation Rate in 41 Years
According to published reports, voter turnout in the eleventh session of elections for Iran’s Islamic Consultative Assembly across the country was below 43 percent.
Official Iranian news agencies announced on Sunday, February 23, 2020, that voter turnout in the elections was only 42.57 percent. In other words, out of at least 58 million eligible voters, only around 25 million participated in these elections, of which 48 percent were women and 52 percent were men.
It has also been announced that elections in eleven constituencies will move to a second round, with the second round scheduled for April 18, 2020, in these constituencies.
These statistics, published by Iran’s official media, show that these elections witnessed the lowest voter turnout in elections over the past 41 years. However, Ayatollah Khamenei, the leader of the Islamic Republic, claimed on Sunday, February 23, 2020, during a fiqh lecture session that opponents of the Islamic Republic had engaged in negative media campaigns against public participation in elections starting several months before the elections began, yet the public still had widespread participation in the elections.
Khamenei cited reports about the spread of coronavirus in Iran as one example of negative media campaigns and said that enemies used every opportunity and “in the last two days, under the pretext of a disease and virus,” attempted to reduce participation, but the people came to vote.
These claims were made by Khamenei while multiple images showing limited voter participation in the elections had previously been circulated on social media.
On the other hand, this round of parliamentary elections, like other elections held in Iran, was accompanied by certain electoral violations, including buying and selling votes in various Iranian cities.
Meanwhile, the U.S. State Department described the entire election process in Iran as “fake and hypocritical” and stated that given the actions of the Guardian Council and government institutions, elections in Iran are neither fair nor free.
The parliamentary elections this time came following the suppression of November 2019 protests, the Revolutionary Guards’ cover-up regarding the downing of a Ukrainian passenger plane, and widespread disqualifications accompanied by multiple sanctions against some prisoners and a group of civil and political activists, including Shirin Ebadi, 12 imprisoned female activists, and Soheil Arabi.
According to Voice of America, the boycott of this round of elections is different from previous rounds and is not limited only to political and civil activists or prisoners; rather, it has been highly popular on social media networks, with many users supporting the boycott of the eleventh session of parliamentary elections.
Brian Hook, the U.S. State Department’s representative for Iran affairs, announced on Thursday, February 20, 2020, at a press conference at the U.S. State Department that the United States has sanctioned several officials overseeing parliamentary elections, including Ahmad Jannati and Mohammad Yazdi. According to the U.S. State Department representative, these individuals have deprived the Iranian people of the right to hold free and fair elections.
Source: Voice of America
