The Supreme Leader
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Velayat e Faqih
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2016-06-22T22:55:18-07:00
Erected around Ayatollah Khomeini, the office of the Supreme Leader is the single most powerful political authority in Iran. The philosophy of Supreme leadership invested in one figure/ a committee of figures from the clergy was provided by Khomeini himself, it a reinterpretation and reapplication of the concept of Velayat e Faqih (Guardianship of the jurist). Ayatollah Ali Khameini is the current Supreme Leader of Iran, only the second one after Ayatollah Khomeini's death in 1989.
Institution of the Supreme Leader is the central tenet of Iran’s iron fist. The nature of its constitutional powers render all other institutions almost powerless to introduce any kind of improvisation to the existing ideals of the revolution. The fact that a non clergymen cannot even be considered to run for the Assembly of Experts, let alone for the post of the Supreme Leader strongly suggests the strict objective of protecting the revolution from the non clergy influence, from anything that predates or undermines the revolution, a classic trait of the Iron fist.
The only way for the Supreme Leader to be impeached is by the Assembly of Experts, a body of 88 clerics popularly elected every ten years to appoint a new or review the incumbent Supreme Leader. There is however no precedent for removal of a Supreme Leader. The only means of checking the power of the Supreme Leader, a post revolution/Iron Fist institution, is held by the Assembly of Experts which is another post revolution/Iron Fist institution.
