A number of Majlis representatives have protested the decision of the presiding board of Iran’s parliament to remove the motion to summon the president to respond to questions from the agenda of the body. In the meantime, Constitution Article 90 committee of the Majlis is currently investigating the 30 violations that Ahmadinejad’s administration is being accused of. This includes a report on 144 violations allegedly perpetrated by presidential aides Mashai and Baghai. Any of these reports can result in launching impeachment procedures against Ahmadinejad.
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Ali Motahari, a principlist Majlis deputy with a record of criticism against Ahmadinejad, protested the mooting of the call for Ahmadinejad to respond to the questions raised by representatives and called the act a sell out for the Majlis. “Please inform us when is a suitable time to ask questions of the president and when not. For example you can say that when the US and Israel have been destroyed is a suitable time. Or, when foreign media have been shut. The mooting of the resolution summoning the president to respond to specific questions was done because of conditions in the country. In the past, we postponed this for months because of the launching of the law on targeted subsidies. When the president had decided to refrain participating in official forums including the cabinet, we waited again and did not present our questions to the presiding board,” Motahari said.
The draft resolution to summon the president to the Majlis to respond to questions raised by MPs is being pursued by Ali Motahari, and it has been through various ups and downs since the resolution. While it had earlier been announced that some 100 deputies had signed a call for the summons and submitted their questions to the presiding board, the issue never made it to the agenda of the parliament. Mostafa Kooakbian also criticized the removal of the questions-resolution from the agenda of the Majlis and called on the spokesperson of the presiding board to provide an explanation regarding the deputies who had withdrawn their request for the summons, and announce their names.
Pressures on Majlis representatives to proceed with questions for the president, requiring his presence in the parliament, come at a time when Fazel Mousavi, a member of the Majlis committee on Article 90 of the Constitution told Etemad newspaper that the committee had confirmed some 30 violations raised against the president by 12 deputies and that a report had detailed the breaches on these.
He further said that the report on Ahmadinejad’s violations and a report on differences that came up over the dismissal of the intelligence minister will be read out on the Majlis floor. If a positive vote emerges on the report, then impeachment of the president must take place.
But this is not the only clash that the Majlis is having with Ahmadinejad since the end of its summer recess. When it was announced that Ahmadinejad’s violations would be investigated by the Majlis, an MP told Fars news agency that “the 33-page documented report on political and financial violations committed by the president’s chief of staff Esfandiar Rahim Mashai and the first vice-president Hamid Bagahi had also been submitted to Article 90 committee of the Majlis for investigation.” Hassan Nowroozi also announced that he was pursuing his complaint against these two individuals in the Article 90 committee.
Mohammad Karamirad, another MP had earlier talked about a 100-page complaint against Baghai and Mashai that had been submitted to Article 90 committee.
The growing pressures on the president and his aides have not produced a very active public response from the two senior aides. With these pressures changing weight every day, it is still not clear whether the president will be summoned to respond to questions by parliamentarians or not.