THE Iranian president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, was publicly humiliated yesterday after the country's supreme leader overruled his decision not to implement a law requiring the government to supply gas to remote villages.
The move, by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, was a blow to the president, whose popularity has been plummeting amid rising food prices and deaths due to gas cuts in the midst of a particularly harsh winter.
In response to a request by the conservative-d
ominated parliament, Mr Khamenei ordered him to implement a law MPs had passed to spend £500 million to supply gas to villages. Mr Ahmadinejad had refused for budgetary reasons.
Gholam Ali Haddad Adel, the parliament's speaker, described Mr Ahmadinejad's refusal as "surprising" and said his appeal to Mr Khamenei was aimed at "defending the dignity of the legislature".
His comments, which were broadcast live on state radio, brought shouts of "well done" from the chamber.
Mr Ahmadinejad was elected in 2005 on a populist agenda, promising to bring oil revenues to every family and to eradicate poverty. "We don't want (you] to bring oil money to our table… just restore heating gas immediately," the MP Valiollah Raeyat said in parliament last week.
Iran has the second-largest natural gas reservoir in the world, but its supply network has been overwhelmed by high demand. Both reformists and conservatives are increasingly asking why Iranians are dying from the cold while the country sits on massive gasfields.
Mr Ahmadinejad is being challenged not only by reformers but by the same conservatives who paved the way for his victory in 2005. They say he has
concentrated too much on fiery anti-US speeches and not enough on the economy.
The full article contains 284 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
