TEHRAN – In a letter to the Supreme Leader on Saturday, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad pointed out that Esfandiar Rahim-Mashaii has resigned from first vice presidency following an order from the Leader.

The president said the resignation was based on the Article 57 of the Constitution.
In a letter, dated July 18, Supreme Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Ali Khamenei stated that appointing Rahim-Mashaii as first vice president is not in the interests of the government and causes “rift and disappointment” among the supporters of the president himself.
Rahim-Mashaii stated that after the Leader’s order he did not consider himself the first vice president. He also pointed out that he is ready to serve the nation in any post.
In a letter to Ahmadinejad, Rahim-Mashaii asked him to accept his resignation.
There was severe opposition to Rahim-Mashaii’s vice presidency due to his remarks about Israeli people. In 2008, Rahim-Mashaii said, “Iran is a friend of the Israeli people” in stark contrast to Iran’s stance on the Zionist regime.
In a cabinet session held in Mashhad on July 16, the president named Rahim-Mashaii as the new first vice president. Ahmadinejad made the cabinet level appointments as part of his plan to make a major reshuffle of the cabinet for his second term in office, which begins in August. However, some political figures in the principlist camp criticized the president for the appointment before he took oath of office.
MP Ahmad Tavakoli from the Majlis principlist majority faction described a delay by Ahmadinejad to dismiss Rahim-Mashaii as a kind of “political misbehavior” which he said was unacceptable.
Tavakoli, the chairman of the Majlis Research Center, said the president was legally obliged to fire the vice president immediately after the Leader’s letter to him on July 18.
“Unfortunately, after seven days there was no action, and Mashaii himself, who was not the addressee to the letter, announced resignation,” Tavakoli told the Mehr News Agency.
Alaeddin Broujerdi, the Majlis National Security and Foreign Policy Committee chairman, also told the MNA that the president should have dismissed Rahim-Mashaii the day the Leader sent him the letter.
He called Ahmadinejad’s decision in appointing Rahim-Mashaii as first VP a “hasty” move before a swearing-in ceremony and a confirmation by the Leader