Supporters of hardline candidate Ebrahim Raisi have rising hopes he will unseat incumbent President Hassan Rouhani in Friday's election, now that Raisi's chief conservative rival, Tehran mayor Mohammad Ghalibaf, has dropped out and thrown his support to Raisi. DUBAI Iranians vote on Friday in a bitter presidential contest between pragmatist President Hassan Rouhani and hardline challenger Ebrahim Raisi that could determine the pace of economic and social reform and Iran's re-engagement with the world.In a warning reflecting rising political tensions amid signs of an unexpectedly close race, Rouhani urged Iran's powerful elite Revolutionary Guards, believed to support Raisi, not to meddle in the election.Suspicions that the Guards and the Basij militia under their control falsified voting results in favour of hardliner Mahmoud Ahmadinejad led to eight months of nationwide protests in 2009. Suspicions that the Guards and the Basij militia under their control falsified voting results in favour of hardliner Mahmoud Ahmadinejad led to eight months of nationwide protests in 2009, which were violently suppressed. It might cause protests similar to those in 2009, as different walks of the society, desiring evolution inside the establishment, have united against Raisi.”

The Guards hope that a win for Raisi will give them an opportunity to claw back economic and political power lost in Shi’ite Iran’s complex theocratic and republican governing structure since 2015, when Iran struck a nuclear deal with world powers that brought it out of international isolation. But Iranians in both political camps suspect he is in fact backing his protege Raisi -- not only for the presidency but potentially also as a possible successor to his own post of supreme leader, which the 77-year-old hardline cleric has held since 1989. Raisi has focused his campaign on the economy, visiting rural areas and villages and promising housing, jobs and more welfare benefits, a message which could resonate with millions of poor voters angry at the Tehran elite. Raisi, a long-serving member of the judiciary who was one of four judges who sentenced thousands of political prisoners to death in 1988, gathered the hardline camp behind him after other conservative candidates dropped out of the race. At rallies and during televised debates over the past few weeks, Rouhani, Raisi, and Ghalibaf, before he dropped out, traded bitter barbs. If no candidate wins more than 50 percent of the vote, the top two, presumably Rouhani and Raisi, would face each other a second time in a run-off in a week. "The enthusiastic participation of Iranians in the election reinforces our national power and security," said Rouhani as he cast his vote in Tehran.
Official campaigning ends with opinion polling showing Hassan Rouhani and Ebrahim Raisi as the two leading candidates.