WHEN AYATOLLAH Ali Khamenei, Iran's supreme leader, wanted to deliver a warning to the opposition that protests against the election result should stop, he delivered it at Friday prayers, writes NAJMEH BOZORGMEHR
Within 24 hours the crackdown by security forces had begun and the mass street protests that followed the re-election of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad subsided.
Today, former president Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani, a supporter of opposition leader Mir-Hossein Moussavi, is expected to use the same platform at Tehran university to express sympathy with those who say the election was fraudulent.
Many believe Mr Rafsanjani’s appearance offers the chance for a mass show of opposition strength on the streets of Tehran – the sort of thing not seen for several weeks. Others believe it could be a springboard for a disparate opposition to gather itself and prepare for the next four years of an Ahmadinejad government.
Mr Moussavi will attend today’s prayers. His insistence that the election was “stolen” is unchanged, but with all legal channels now closed to any appeal against the result, his advisers say he has turned to looking at the creation of a broad political bloc made up of anti-government forces willing to continue peaceful civil protests.
Some reformists called on him to form a political party. But the obligation to obtain a permit from a government he insists is “illegitimate” was an obvious barrier. Others called on him to create a “political front” instead. The interior ministry said this week that either would need government authorisation.
The objective is to maintain the momentum created by the pro-reform parties in the aftermath of the election. Alireza Beheshti, a senior adviser to Mr Moussavi, said that the former prime minister was reviewing a “network-based move”.
“This network won’t really have a pyramid shape in decision-making as exists in political parties and fronts,” he said. “Various groups, individuals and different associations, whether traditional or modern, can reach minimal consensus [under the network] and connect to each other like prayer beads while observing own identities.” It is not clear how practical such a move might be or how the regime – which has detained hundreds of opposition supporters since the election – would react.
“The truth is, there are not many options available,” said a senior reformist. “All the roads are blocked to make Moussavi [who spent the past 20 years as an artist] go back to his paintings.”
Supporters of Mr Moussavi remain disorganised while the night-time chanting of slogans from rooftops – consciously borrowed from the 1979 revolution – is weakening.
But their presence on the internet is still strong – they encourage civil disobedience and spread messages on blogs, encouraging each other not to use goods advertised on state television and to boycott the Nokia Siemens Network, accused of providing Tehran with phone-tapping equipment.
There is also an e-mail campaign calling on Iranians to plug in energy-sapping devices on Monday evening in an attempt to cause a power black-out.
The e-mailers say this is to commemorate the one-month anniversary of the death of Neda Agha-Soltan, the student whose death became an international symbol of the protests.
When Mr Moussavi announced he would attend Friday prayers “in line with safeguarding the legitimate rights [of people] to have a free and honourable life,” it immediately sparked an exchange of messages urging people to attend.
In response, Kayhan, the leading conservative newspaper, yesterday urged supporters of Mr Ahmadinejad to turn up but warned them to avoid clashes, which it said could help the opposition look “victimised”. – Copyright The Financial Times Ltd 2009