Pezeshkian vows to extend his hand to all Iranians after winning the run-off with 53.7 percent of the votes cast.
Iran’s president-elect Masoud Pezeshkian has vowed to extend his hand to all Iranians in his first remarks after being declared the winner of a run-off against hardline rival Saeed Jalili.
“The difficult path ahead will not be smooth except with your companionship, empathy, and trust. I extend my hand to you,” Pezeshkian said in a post on X on Saturday, echoing an earlier promise to “extend the hand of friendship to everyone” if he won.
“By gaining [the] majority of the votes cast on Friday, Pezeshkian has become Iran’s next president,” the Ministry of Interior said on Saturday.
Pezeshkian secured 53.7 percent of the votes, or 16.3m of the more than 30 millions votes cast, according to the official count. Jalili received 44.3 percent, or 13.5m.
Shortly after the ministry’s announcement, Jalili conceded defeat, saying anybody who is elected by the people must be respected.
“Not only should he be respected, but now we must use all our strength and help him move forward with strength,” he told state television.
There were scenes of celebration after the results were declared, with small groups of Pezeshkian supporters taking to the streets.
Low turnout
Participation in the election was 49.8 percent in a tight race between Pezeshkian, the sole moderate in the original field of four candidates who has pledged to open Iran to the world, and the former nuclear negotiator Jalili, who is a staunch advocate of deepening Iran’s ties to Russia and China.
The run-off on Friday followed a June 28 ballot with an historically low turnout, when more than 60 percent of Iranian voters abstained from the snap election for a successor to Ebrahim Raisi, following his death in a helicopter crash in May.
In the June election, Pezeshkian received about 42.5 percent of votes and Jalili some 38.7 percent.
Only 40 percent of 61 million eligible voters cast their ballot in June, the lowest turnout in any presidential election since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
Reporting from Tehran, Al Jazeera’s Resul Serdar noted that about 50 percent of Iranians didn’t vote as some didn’t “have faith that the election will bring any change, whether the winner is a conservative or a reformist”.
Others boycotted the election, Serdar said. “This is a silent protest.”
Political analysts say Pezeshkian’s triumph might see the promotion of a pragmatic foreign policy, ease tensions over the now-stalled negotiations with major powers to revive a 2015 nuclear deal and improve prospects for social liberalisation as well as political pluralism in Iran.
However, many voters in Iran are sceptical about Pezeshkian’s ability to fulfil his campaign promises as the former health minister has publicly stated he has no intention of confronting Iran’s powerful elite of Muslim scholars and security hawks.
Both presidential candidates promised to revive the flagging economy, beset by mismanagement and sanctions reimposed since 2018 after the United States’ then-President Donald Trump unilaterally ditched the nuclear deal.
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