Iran’s Guardian Council rejected new bill giving parliament a say on the appointment of the head of the Central Bank.
Abbas Ali Kadkhodai, spokesman for the Guardian Council, announced that the Council has rejected parliament’s bill because according to the constitution the head of the Central Bank cannot be chosen by the parliament.
He maintained that the Council has also found ten other points of dispute in the new bill which needs to be reviewed by the Members of Parliament once more.
The latest bill approved by the parliament yesterday proposed that the head of the Central Bank would be appointed by the president which after being approved by the General Assembly of the Bank, had to also be approved by a majority vote in the parliament.
Currently the parliament is excluded from the process of designating the head of the Central Bank and the task is basically the president’s domain.
The new bill also proposes a change in the composition of the General Assembly of the Central Bank.
In an earlier proposal, also rejected by the Guardian Council, the parliament had called for the exclusion of the president from the Assembly; however, in the this bill, while the president was included in the Assembly as its chief, the parliament had vied for a say in the choice of the Central Bank chief and also emphasized on the expertise of the person appointed to this position.
Analysts have criticized the overt powers of the president over the Central Bank decisions and maintain that the Bank needs greater independence from the government in order to take effective decisions in monetary and economic affairs.
