On the even of the eight Majlis parliamentary elections, the new jury of Tehran’s Press ‎Court passed a verdict against the Mardomsalari newspaper belonging to the reformist ‎Mardomsalari (Populist) party. ‎

The offense of the managing editor of the newspaper is that he published President ‎Ahmadinejad’s remarks that the latter made at a meeting of businessmen as reported by ‎Reuter’s news agency. Mardomsalari was banned despite the fact that most Iranian news ‎agencies had published the President’s remarks that he “obtained his economic ‎information from the local butcher.” ‎

About four months ago Ahmadinejad told a group of businessmen,” We have ‎hardworking businessmen in our neighborhood from whom I get the important economic ‎information because they live among the people and so know everything. For example, ‎there is an honest butcher in our neighborhood who knows all the problems of the people. ‎And so I get my important economic news from him.”‎

Citing the publication of these remarks by Ahmadinejad, infamous prosecutor Saeed ‎Mortezavi charged Mostafa Kovakbian, the managing editor of Mardomsalari with ‎publishing false information with the purpose of humiliating the President. Tehran’s ‎newly formed Press Court jury endorsed the charges and passed the verdict that he had ‎indeed committed a crime. The jury did not even consider the editor worthy of any ‎leniency.‎

Political analysts have interpreted the court verdict to be a warning to journalists. Another ‎issue that has caught the attention of those watching the Iranian media is the presence of a ‎member on the jury who is considered to be a representative of a pressure group. ‎Roohollah Jome’i is a known member of a pressure group in the town of Semnan. ‎Although he was a student of Azad University in Semnan, he participated in most ‎political events of the reformers at another institution, Semnan University in the same ‎town and always disrupted the meetings.‎

During the 1997 presidential elections Jome’i had physical clashes with candidate ‎Mohammad Khatami’s elections committee and even attacked the elections bus that ‎future President Khatami was traveling in.‎

After the elections, Jome’i worked at the conservative Resalat newspaper and following ‎the sixth parliamentary elections worked at the national radio and television network as a ‎reporter covering parliamentary issues.‎

During the last presidential elections in 2005, Jome’i worked at the elections ‎headquarters of current President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. After Ahmadinejad’s victory, ‎he became the head of the public relations office of country’s Vocational and ‎Professional Training Organization.‎