Masoumeh Ebtekar, the Vice President for Women’s and Family Affairs, said that she had written to the Secretary of the Guardian Council to approve a woman for the first time in Iran’s history. Referring to the Constitutional definition of a presidential candidate, Ebtekar said “I asked the Guardian Council to approve a woman among the candidates for the first time to help revive the country's social capital”.
Tejarat published an analysis on the possibility of women candidates in this election. In previous elections, women have been able to nominate but have never been approved, partially due to the wording of the Constitutional law on the criteria for President, the meaning of which is in dispute. Last year, a spokesperson for the Guardian Council, Abbas-Ali Kadkhodaei, said that women were not excluded by law, although it has been unclear whether this was his personal opinion or that of the Guardian Council. So far, two women, Faezeh Hashemi Rafsanjani and Sara Fadaei, both academics, have announced their candidacy, but the analysis also speculated that several other women might nominate. These include Elham Aminzadeh (former Vice President for Legal Affairs), Masoumeh Ebtekar (Vice President for Women and Families), Shahindokht Molaverdi (former Rouhani cabinet member), Zahra Nejad-Bahram (Tehran city councillor), and Marzieh Vahid-Dastjerdi (former Ahmadinejad cabinet minister). Faezeh Hashemi is the most prominent to nominate so far, although she does not expect to be approved: “Since I have a prison record, and am facing another case and a sentence, I will definitely be disqualified. But since I believe in women registering for elections, I will do so symbolically”.
Masoumeh Ebtekar, the Vice President for Women and Family Affairs, on the 42nd anniversary of the referendum creating the Islamic Republic stated on Twitter that then as now the Iranian people should be involved in all state decisions. Adding that the Presidential Elections will be another referendum, Ebtekar was supporting President Rouhani’s repeated statements that deadlocks in government should be resolved through referendum.