Iranians vote to elect new parliament

14:04, 21.02.2020

Polls have opened across Iran in the country’s eleventh parliamentary election, seen as a test for the popularity of President Hassan Rouhani’s reformist-moderate camp, which has dominated Parliament since 2016.

Nearly 58 million people are eligible to vote on pre-selected lists of candidates that represent more than 250 registered parties. All voters must be more than 18 years of age. Almost three million are first-time voters.

A total of 55,000 polling stations have been set up at mosques throughout the country. More than 7,000 candidates, including 666 women, are competing.

Parliamentary candidates in Iran are usually aligned with reformists or conservatives as the two main political currents, as Al Jazeera reports.

But this time, the election will likely be a competition between conservatives supporting Tehran’s former mayor Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, who backed the 2015 nuclear deal and ultra-conservatives who rejected it.

All ballots are counted manually, delaying official results for up to two or three days after the vote.

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parliamentary election