Less than six months before the end of his first term as president, Seyed Mohammad Khatami made a third reshuffle in his cabinet on Wednesday that makes clear that he will fight next June's election.

Four ministries, agriculture, construction jihad, mines and metals, and industries were merged to form two, which are now called the Ministry of Agriculture Jihad and the Ministry of Industries and Mines.

On the eve of the May 1997 election, President Khatami made several promises to his voters. One was to bring new faces into the government. When he announced the first cabinet members, people were really disappointed because the same old faces were there who served in the previous administration of the Islamic Republic.

Officials such as Abdollah Nouri, Seyed Ataollah Mohajerani, Hassan Habibi, Mostafa Moin, and Mohammad Farhadi served the government of Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani as his very close allies.

The same were picked up by Khatami for sensitive and important posts such as the Interior Ministry and the Ministry of Culture.

This is the same old practice as was carried out by his predecessor, Rafsanjani. Issa Kalantari, Gholamreza Shafe'i and Saeidikia were ousted from the cabinet, but were appointed presidential advisers.

The new Roads and Transportation Minister Rahman Dadman was previously working for the same ministry's railway network. Others, such as Mahmoud Hojjati, the former minister of roads and transportation, and Es'haq Jahangiri, the former minister of mines and metals, are also now presidential advisers.

It is really surprising that for over a decade the same people have been serving the nation with a change in their portfolios while a long list of recently educated and more learned young people are waiting for a chance to serve their nation.

The irony is that the government of President Khatami criticizes the economic policies of Rafsanjani, but appoints the authors of Rafsanjani's economic policies to his cabinet. The same holds true with regard to political development. Is it possible to launch new economic policies with the same team? Is it possible to launch political development with the team which did not believe in it? Anyway, by making changes in his cabinet, Khatami removed the uncertainty that existed in the political circles of Iran. Of course, his brother Mohammadreza Khatami late last month announced that Khatami would run in the next presidential election.

Many believe that Khatami will win but with a reduced number of votes compared with the 1997 election as the people are very much disappointed with the growing sickness of the country's economy and also with the ever-increasing factional fighting.