Despite all the claims of the Iranian government about a great win and people’s participation in the 2021 presidential election, the state-run media could not hide the blow on the government and the people’s ignorance and boycott of this election. A blow which its effects will become visible in the next month, widening the gap between this government and the people, who have lost their trust in this regime.
Even the regime’s main social base which the officials called the ‘Mostazafin’ (the oppressed) is not supporting this regime anymore as the outcome of this election showed and the state-run media admitted.
State-run daily Etemad Online in a short article entitled, ‘Why do officials ignore the non-participation of 30 million Iranians? / The officials of the Islamic Republic must declare a state of emergency among themselves’ on June 20, 2021, wrote:
“Four years ago, in such days, more than 41.300 million people participated in the presidential elections. In that election, 56 million eligible voters cast their ballots. Yesterday, however, the number of voters dropped to less than 29 million; a huge drop of 12 million people; At a time that the number of eligible people has increased by 4 million.
“In other words, in the 2017 presidential election, 15 million eligible people did not participate, but in the 1400 election, this number has doubled to about 30 million.
“Thus, for the first time in the history of the Islamic Republic, the participation rate fell to half of the eligible and a meaningful number of 48.8% was recorded. Also keep in mind that the presidential election was held at the same time as the council elections, which is inherently participatory due to its local nature.
“The point is that a significant proportion of voters in the presidential election voted white or invalid. No one could have imagined that one day in the Islamic Republic, the invalid ballots with 14% would take second place in the elections.
“In such circumstances, the officials of the Islamic Republic must declare a state of emergency among themselves and investigate immediately and without prejudice why more than half of the people did not participate in the elections.
“It would be a great strategic mistake to ignore the tens of millions of Iranians who did not vote or give a white or protesting vote and to ignore the fact that many previous voters did not go to the polls this time. Listening to the voices of the silent (people) and the protesters is not a moral duty that is necessary for the rule and the survival of the rule.
“Doubling the number of voters who boycotted the ballot box and the reaching of invalid ballots from 3% of the previous election to 13% is a loud voice that must either be heard and respected or wait for the disastrous consequences.” (State-run website Etemad Online, June 20, 2021)
And with similar content, two other state-run outlets while shocked about the result of the election showed their fear and wrote:
“More than 3.7 million people did not write the names of any candidates on their ballots in the 13th presidential election. They went to the polls and actually ran in the election but did not find the candidate they wanted.
“The ‘undecided’ people, or those who wanted to run but did not have a preferred candidate, had a very significant number of over 50% of the turnout since the announcement of the Guardian Council.” (State-run daily Nameh, June 20, 2021)
“None of the statistics extracted from the electoral contests were as shocking as the figures of the invalid ballots. The number 3,726,870 indicated that a significant portion of the population did not consider any of the candidates eligible for the presidency of Iran. An issue that has not been seen in any of the last 12 rounds of elections.
“But one of the remarkable points of the results was that the second person in this election was not one of the candidates, but more than three million invalid votes and Nasser Hemmati also fell behind Mohsen Rezaei and became the third person. Some say that if this number of invalid votes is deducted from the total turnout, the turnout will be significantly lower than what was announced. At the same time, this number of invalid votes has a clear message to the political atmosphere of the country.
“In a way, it shows that the more than three million people who decided to run in the elections for any reason did not accept any of the candidates in this scene. This number of invalid ballots was unprecedented in the Iranian elections.” (State-run daily Hamdeli, June 20, 2021)
