Iran's President Hassan Rouhani responded to the May 20 announcement of his sweeping victory in the presidential election by declaring that Iranians had chosen "the path of interaction with the world, away from violence and extremism".

The official results for the May 19 election were confirmed by the interior ministry as Rouhani – 23,549,616 votes (57.13%); hardline religious judge Ebrahim Raisi – 15,786,449 (38.30%); conservative former culture minister Mostafa Mir-Salim – 478,215 (1.16%) and reformist former vice president Mostafa Hashemitaba – 215,450 (0.52%).

Many Iranians celebrated on the streets across the May 19 Saturday evening to acclaim centrist pragmatist Rouhani’s victory – the fact that men and women were seen dancing in public together drew the ire of some strictly religious hardliners, according to local media – but the feeling among those who voted for the incumbent was perhaps better summed up by Karim Sadjadpour, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment. He told Reuters: "Iranians are perhaps not overly optimistic that Rouhani can move the country forward, but at least he didn't want to drive the country backward."

Despite the hardliners’ defeat Donald Trump did not at all moderate his hostility towards Tehran in remarks made during his weekend visit to Saudi Arabia in which he continued to accuse the Iranians of sponsoring terrorism and sowing turmoil in the Middle East, but Rouhani and Iran at least received a boost from the European Union in the form of congratulations from new French President Emmanuel Macron.

Macron added in a May 20 statement that he would ask the French government to work on the intensification of economic, scientific and cultural ties with Iran.

Rouhani was declared the landslide winner of the election after the vote drew a surprisingly large and enthusiastic turnout of more than 70%.

The avid turnout of more than 70% forced the extension of voting by six hours in many places to midnight.

Iranian ministers were clearly thrilled by the large participation in the vote, with Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif tweeting: “We derive stability not from 'coalitions', but from our people, who - unlike many - do vote. Iranians must be respected & are ready to engage.”

The result could set Iran’s course for the next generation with Rouhani, a pragmatist and centrist who favours opening up to more Western trade and investment, having fended off Raisi, who proposed a far more self-reliant economy and wanted to limit relations with the outside world.

The signs of voters flocking to the polling stations were immediately taken by many observers as favouring Rouhani. His supporters had long feared that apathy among young reformist voters – 60% of Iran’s population of 80mn are under 35 – could undermine his bid for a second term. But on the day it was not the case at all. His second victory greatly outdid his first election victory in 2013 when he secured 18.6mn, or 50.71%, of votes cast.

To avoid a second round in an Iranian presidential election, the winning candidate must secure more than 50% of the vote. There are currently over 56.4mn eligible voters in Iran and among the Iranian diaspora.

Rouhani’s comprehensive defeat of Raisi drew an angry response from some ultra-conservatives who claimed the president had resorted to undignified, insulting attacks on hardline elements of Iran during his campaign. The Ammar website, the media outlet of the Basij hardline volunteer militia, responded: "Hassan Rouhani can for a month destroy the judiciary, the Revolutionary Guards and the Basij and... and no one can tell him anything?"

Poor feel let down

During the campaign, Raisi, a 56-year-old protege of supreme leader Ali Khamenei, made a point of visiting poor neighbourhoods. Many struggling Iranians feel let down by the lack of economic gains delivered by Rouhani’s signing of the late 2015 nuclear deal agreed with the major powers in return for a curbing of Tehran’s atomic development programme – an IMF snapshot released in February showed that although inflation has dropped from highs of near 40% to single digits under the president, and real GDP grew by as much as 7.4% last year, growth in the non-oil sector has averaged just 0.9%.

The final stretch of campaigning saw Rouhani, a 68-year-old moderate cleric, step up his attempts at rousing young voters who, while disappointed with the extent and pace of reformist progress in the Islamic Republic, were alarmed by the prospect of having their individual rights even further curtailed under Raisi.

"I voted for Rouhani to prevent Raisi's victory. I don't want a hardliner to be my president," Ziba Ghomeyshi told Reuters in Tehran. "I waited in the line for five hours to cast my vote."

In contrast, Najemah Farahani, a 37-year-old housewife voting in the poorer south side of the capital, which is dominated by conservatives, told The Guardian: “Raisi tackles capitalism and injustice. Don’t you get bothered or upset when someone in your country gets extremely rich, and others are very poor?” She added that Raisi was more in line with the values of Khamenei, saying. “We love our supreme leader, and we love our religion.”

Isolationist Raisi promised impoverished citizens vastly more welfare benefits and jobs if elected. It was clear he had the backing of Iran’s powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) – a super-wealthy player in the Iranian business world as well as the predominant military and security force in the country – and it appeared he had the tacit support of Khamenei, a man many analysts think he could succeed.

However, in public Khamenei remained neutral and repeatedly called for a high turnout to demonstrate to the world the great enthusiasm Iranians have for their nation. To many outsiders, Iran has a curious combination of theocracy and democracy but at the end of the day, despite the considerable influence of the president, ultimate power rests with the supreme leader.

Respect promised for result

"I respect the outcome of the vote of the people and the result will be respected by me and all the people," Raisi remarked after the end of voting, according to the semi-official Fars news agency. However, Raisi later appeared at the interior ministry complaining that many polling stations had run out of voting slips and that in many instances Rouhani's supporters were guilty of illegally campaigning on the day of the vote. More ballot papers were subsequently sent out, the agency reported. 

Prior to the election, some analysts described Raisi as odds-on favourite to become Iran’s next supreme leader. Commentators are now divided on whether the election defeat has so tainted Raisi that his chances of succeeding Khamenei have dissolved. Many critics of his presidential campaign said it failed to deliver any inspirational fresh ideas and that Raisi as a candidate lacked charisma.

Iranian news agencies reported that voting in the election among the worldwide Iranian diaspora reached record-breaking levels. Attempts were even made to fly more ballot papers to Istanbul, where voting was said to be 20 times higher than it was in the 2013 election. The number of Iranians in Russia that voted was reportedly four times as high.

In the run-up to polling day, the televised debates between the candidates became unprecedentedly hostile and a conservative, Tehran mayor Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf pulled out of the race, urging his voters to get behind Raisi. However, local media reports from Tehran indicated that the capital's merchant “bazaar class” had largely swung behind Rouhani after Qalibaf quit, as they did not trust Raisi to pursue a credible economic plan.

In the last two weeks of campaigning, Rouhani told the IRGC not to meddle in the vote. Claims that the Guards and the Basij militia under their control falsified voting results in favour of the re-election of populist hardliner Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in 2009 led to huge street protests that were violently suppressed.