The final list of vetted candidates has been sent by the Guardian Council to the Ministry of Interior, who will announce the list on the afternoon of Tuesday May 25. FarsNews published a list of seven candidates, supposedly leaked by a journalist who was shown the list: Ebrahim Raisi, Mohsen Rezaei, Mohsen Mehr-Alizadeh, Saeed Jalili, Ali-Reza Zakani, Amir-Hossein Ghazizadeh Hashemi, Abdul-Naser Hemmati.
Reformist candidate Mohsen Mehr-Alizadeh said in an interview that he had no slogan as the people were tired of populist rhetoric that offered no solutions. Mehr-Alizadeh added that the country’s economic problems were not purely issues of economy, but also pointed to the general mismanagement of domestic matters, as well as poor foreign policy.
The third day of registrations took place on the festival of Eid al-Fitr, the feast marking the holy Muslim fasting month of Ramadan. Among the prominent figures who registered were parliamentarians Mohammad-Reza Sabbaghian and Mahmoud Sadeghi, high-profile diplomat Ramin Mehmanparast, prominent Reformist Mohsen Mehr-Alizadeh.
The Way of the Nation Party announced prominent Reformist and former governor of Isfahan and Khorasan provinces, Mohsen Mehr-Alizadeh, as their candidate in this election. Alongside Masoud Pezeshkian, Mehr-Ali-Zadeh is one of the most prominent ethnic Azeri candidates to so far enter the race. Ethnic Azeris make up between 20-25% of the population of Iran.
Three Reformist candidates – Mostafa Kavakebian, Mohsen Mehr-Alizadeh and Masoud Pezeshkian – met in the office of a fourth, Mohsen Rahami, to celebrate iftar on Saturday night. The meeting, which was not advertised to the media, was allegedly to discuss the political situation in Iran and strategies for the Reformists in the Presidential election.