Ebrahim Raeisi is a frontrunner in the next presidential election in Iran

Ebrahim Raeisi is a frontrunner in the next Iranian presidential election. Fifty-four percent of the likely voters in the latest Stasis poll say that they will vote for Raeisi, followed by Saeed Jalili (the former national security adviser, 3.4%), Naser Hemati (the former head of the Central Bank, under Rouhani’s administration, 3.1%), and Mohsen Rezaee (the former head of the Revolutionary Guard, 2.5%).

Question: Regardless of the likelihood of your participation in the upcoming presidential election, if you wanted to vote, of these names who have been qualified by the Guardian Council, who would you choose? The candidates are listed here in alphabetical order. Jalili, Rezaee, Raeisi, Zakani, Ghazizadeh, Mehralizadeh or Hemati?

The poll, conducted by Stasis for IITV between May 28 and June 01, 2021, also found that only approximately 30% of Iranian citizens will participate in the upcoming presidential election. Twelve percent of Iranians are undecided as to whether they will vote and another 58% prefer to not cast a ballot at all.

The results of this poll show that 54% of Iranians disapprove of the way that the Guardian Council disqualifies candidates in the elections; 32 percent approves.

Question: You might be aware that the Guardian Council has disqualified some of the presidential nominees and they cannot run in the election. Generally speaking, do you agree or disagree with how the Guardian Council disqualified these candidates?

The respondents were also asked specifically about four of the potential candidates who were disqualified by the Guardian Council, including: former President Ahmadinejad, Vice-President Jahangiri, former Speaker Larijani and one of the pioneer figures among the Reformists, Tajzadeh. Based on this poll, just 25% of respondents said they agree with the Guardian Council’s disqualification of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad; 55% disagree. However, the numbers of those who agree with the Guardian Council’s decision to disqualify Vice-President Jahangiri (48%) and former Speaker Larijani (47%), far outpace the level of disagreement (16% and 21% respectively). As for Tajzadeh, 24% agree with his disqualification, 11% disagrees, and 45% said that they have no idea who he is.

Question: Mahmoud Ahmadinejad / Mostafa Tajzadeh / Eshagh Jahngiri / Ali Larijani: do you agree or disagree with his disqualification?

Even though Ahmadinejad has been disqualified by the Guardian Council, this poll asked respondents hypothetically: if he were to have qualified for candidacy, and was able to compete with Mr. Raeisi, who would they choose? In this scenario, 46% would vote for Ahmadinejad, as opposed to 24% who would vote for Raeisi.

Question: Regardless of the likelihood of your participation in the upcoming presidential election, if Mr. Ahmadinejad were to have qualified to run as a candidate, and was able to compete with Mr. Raeisi, who would have been your choice? I mean who would you vote for? Mr. Ahmadinejad or Mr. Raeisi?

Generally speaking, Iranians do not believe the president has enough power to solve the issues the country faces. Just 26% of respondents say the president has a lot of power to do so, as opposed to 24% who believe the president does not have enough power or has very little power. 45% also believe that he has some power to an extent.

Question: In your opinion, to what extent is the president capable of solving the issues the country faces? Does he have a lot of power to solve these problems, some power, not much power, or no power at all?

Remarks

The results of this poll have been interactively visualized in this link.

This is an interactive platform detailing the results of every question, distinguished by gender, age group, location, and education in a bar chart.

For each question, there is a bubble chart (consisting of many small circles), detailing the respondents’ information. Each circle represents a single respondent and by clicking on it, you can find the complete answer set for that particular respondent. The color coding is consistent between the bubble chart and bar chart for easy comparison.

Methodology

• Telephone interviews were conducted from May 28 and June 01, 2021, with a random sample of 1,473 Iranians aged 18 and older living in Iran. Native Farsi speakers conducted the interviews during daylight hours.
• The proportional two-stage sample includes respondents from every province. Provinces have been sampled based on their population.
• Based on the sample, there is a 95% confidence that the margin of sampling error is ± 2.5 percentage points (likely voters excluded).
• Results are weighted by gender, age, and location (urban vs. rural areas) based on the Iranian national census of 2016 and 2018 statistical yearbook.
• Rates of respondent candor and reliability were appraised by experienced interviewers. Fifty-eight persons found to be lacking in these areas were removed from the sample.
• This poll was carried out by Stasis for Iran International TV.