166 Qualified to Run for Iran’s Assembly of Experts
TEHRAN (Tasnim) – Iran’s Guardian Council has qualified a total number of 166 persons to run for the Assembly of Experts election, slated for late February, an official announced Tuesday.
Results of the process of vetting those who had registered for the Assembly of Experts election indicate that 166 hopefuls are eligible to run for the votes, while 215 others have failed to obtain qualification, the spokesman for the Election Monitoring Central Committee, Siamak Rahpeik, told Tasnim on Tuesday.
Initially, 794 people had registered to run for the 5th round of the Assembly of Expert election, among whom 158 withdrew from the competition, 111 were not allowed in the vetting process, and 152 others refused to take a necessary exam, he explained.
The final vetting process included 373 people, while 166 have been put on the list of the final candidates, Rahpeik added.
37 of the Assembly of Experts hopefuls come from the province of Tehran.
Many famous figures had registered for the contest, including President Hassan Rouhani, Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati, Ayatollah Seyed Ahmad Khatami and Hassan Khomeini, the grandson of the late founder of the Islamic Republic of Iran, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.
Hassan Khomeini, however, failed to get qualification to run for the race.
The Assembly of Experts elections and the parliamentary elections will be held simultaneously on February 26, 2016.
The Assembly of Experts is a high-ranking body that elects the leader of the Islamic Revolution.
Members of the assembly are directly elected to office by people for an eight-year term. It holds biannual meetings to appoint a new chairman.