The doctrine of Velayat-e-Faqih (Guardianship of the Islamic Jurists), the cornerstone of the Khomeinist system has been undermined.
If all goes well, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad will be formally sworn in today for a second four year-term as President of the Islamic Republic of Tehran.
Will he be able to complete his term? Will the nationwide protests against his re-election fade away?
No one knows the answer to these questions.
However, one thing is already clear: the doctrine of Velayat-e-Faqih (Guardianship of the Islamic Jurists), the cornerstone of the Khomeinist system has been undermined.
For almost 30 years, the system worked in Iran, at least as far as the Khomeinist elite is concerned. On most issues, there would be enough vigorous debate to persuade many people that there was a measure of democracy in Khomeinism. In the end, however, the Supreme Leader would announce the ultimate decision in a special sermon.
In the past few weeks, however, it has become clear that the system no longer works.
Message
His message is always the same: Ahmadinejad's landslide re-election victory should be hailed as an "Islamic miracle" rather than a crude exercise in fraud.
The trouble is that the number of those who doubt the election results seems to be growing by the day.
In 20 years Khamenei used the Fasl el-Khitab card in public only once - in 1991 to crush the students' revolt in Tehran. In the past few weeks, however, he has played the same card at least half a dozen times, so far with no effect.
Over two decades, Khamenei built himself a persona as a pious recluse cultivating taciturnity as an art.
The idea was that while others fought for personal or partisan motives, the Supreme Leader, living an ascetic life devoted to prayer and introspection, would intervene only to close the debate and unite the ummah (the community of the faithful.)
Since 1979, when the clerics seized power, the doctrine of Velayat-e-Faqih has been at the centre of Iranian political debate. The Khomeinist elite defended it by claiming that the function of the Supreme Leader was to stand above factions, prevent extremism, and arbitrate divisive issues in the broader interest of the ummah. Supporters of pluralism and democracy, on the other hand, saw the doctrine as a façade for religious despotism.
As often in history, the debate appears to have been concluded by real events rather than rhetorical pirouettes. Over the past few weeks, Khamenei, emerging from his reclusion, has been outspoken. Rather than calming spirits and fostering consensus, his frequent interventions have deepened existing divisions and fanned the fires of opposition to the regime.
Khamenehi has made no secret of his rooting for Ahmadinejad. A year before the election, he told Ahmadinejad to "work as if you have five more years, not just one", clearly indicating the hope that the incumbent would secure a second-term.
More surprisingly, Khamenei did not even wait for the publication of official election results before congratulating Ahmadinejad on his "miraculous victory". And, when the opposition disputed the election results, Khamenehi cast himself in the role of chief spokesman for the Ahmadinejad camp. For almost a week, the re-elected president was nowhere to be seen while the Supreme Leader was fighting on his behalf.
It is now clear that in just five weeks Khamenehi squandered political capital built up over more than three decades. Although he remains a powerful player in the Iranian political game, Khamenei is no longer above the melee.
In the past week alone, two former presidents of Iran, Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani and Mohammad Khatami, both of them clerics with impressive Khomeinist credentials, have made it clear that they no longer believe in Velayat-e-Faqih. Both have refused to obey Khamenei and recognise Ahmadinejad's re-election. They have also boycotted events organised by Khamenehi.
Mir Hussain Mousavi, Mehdi Karroubi and Mohsen Rezaei, the three candidates supposedly defeated by Ahmadinejad, have also made it clear that they no longer believe in Velayat-e-Faqih.
More importantly, Khamenei's Fasl el-Khitab continues to be challenged by daily demonstrations in Tehran and at least a dozen other major cities. The regime still controls Tehran and all those cities, but thanks only to the Iranian Revolutionary Guards (IRG) and the Basij militia, not the authority of the Supreme Leader.
Until the current crisis exposed the fundamental contradictions of the Khomeinist system, the function of the Supreme Leader appeared to have at least one justification: it prevented civil war within the ruling elite.
With Khamenei adopting a clearly partisan position, that justification is now gone. The Khomeinist elite are in a state of civil war with the risk that they could drag the whole nation into a period of strife with no end in sight.
For 30 years, disagreement over Velayat-e-Faqih was a barrier to creating a broad coalition for genuine reform and change. That disagreement is now fading, with only a shrinking segment of the Khomeinist constituency still clinging to this concept. And that is, perhaps, the true "miracle" that happened last month.
Amir Taheri is an Iranian writer based in Europe.
Source: http://archive.gulfnews.com/articles/09/08/05/10337430.html
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