Iran’s first Vice President Mohammad Mokhber was appointed as acting president of the Islamic Republic on Monday after the death of President Ebrahim Raisi in a helicopter crash in the country’s northwest. Mokhber, 68, largely has been in the shadows compared to other politicians in Iran’s Shiite theocracy. Raisi’s death under the constitution thrust Mokhber into public view. He is expected to serve as caretaker president for some 50 days before mandatory presidential elections in Iran.Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei made the announcement of Mokhber’s appointment in a condolence message he shared for Raisi’s death in the crash Sunday. The helicopter was found Monday in northwestern Iran.Despite his low-key public profile, Mokhber has held prominent positions with in the country’s power structure, particularly in its bonyads, or charitable foundations.
Those groups were fueled by donations or assets seized after Iran’s 1979 Islamic Revolution, particularly those previously associated with Iran’s shah or those in his government. Mokhber oversaw a bonyad known in English as the Execution of Imam Khomeini’s Order, or EIKO, referring to the late Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.