While President Hassan Rouhani focused on Iran’s educated middle class ahead of the May 19 vote, his conservative rivals targeted the poor. Having achieved an impressive victory, Rouhani now faces the challenge of maintaining this enormous asset, namely the Reform and moderation movement. Failing to do so could mean a return of hard-liners to power, as in 2005, when then-Reformist President Mohammad Khatami was succeeded by Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
In his first campaign documentary, which aired on state television May 3, conservative presidential candidate Ebrahim Raisi tried to concentrate on the vulnerable social classes. The documentary, dubbed “The People’s Concert,” attempted to take the focus off of concert cancellations as a result of pressure by conservative clerics and instead give the sense that jobs and housing are more important. In the documentary, Raisi said, “Are concerts really the people’s problem? Don’t people laugh at us? Our workers are unemployed. They have no bread or homes. And then we talk of concerts?”
