Teaching Comparative Government and Politics

Tuesday, January 22, 2008

More on Iranian politics

This is politics within the power elite. Nazila Fathi reported for The New York Times about another split between the president and the "supreme leader." There's no need to refer to left-wing opposition. (See: Politics of inaction)

Iran Leader Backs Parliament in a Dispute With Ahmadinejad

"The supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, intervened after Mr. Ahmadinejad had refused to carry out a measure that required his government to supply gas to remote villages during this year’s exceptionally cold winter.

"The government provides natural gas to the state-run gas company for a fee, and the gas is then sold to customers...

"The speaker of Parliament, Gholamali Hadad Adel, said that Mr. Ahmadinejad had complained to him in the past months about some of the measures passed by Parliament. But Mr. Hadad Adel said he was surprised by a recent letter from Mr. Ahmadinejad in which he said that the natural gas law was unconstitutional.

"'I was surprised by the president writing to Parliament to say a bill was against the Constitution,' he was quoted as saying by the semiofficial Mehr news agency. 'This is unprecedented.' He added that it was the job of the Guardian Council, which is appointed by the supreme leader, to decide if a law passed by Parliament was unconstitutional..."

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