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Iran's President Mahmud Ahmadinejad has said that his successor has already been designated by God. Ahmadinejad reportedly made the comments in a March 16 meeting of provincial councils in the Iranian capital.

"Several friends had come and were saying, 'We're worried about the future.' I said, 'The future has been decided, go do your work, the result will come.' [One of them] said, 'Who's the next one?' I said, 'Do you think God doesn't know who's next?' He said [yes, he knows]. I said, 'So why are you sad? The time is over when they could rule people through factional games.'"

Ahmadinejad did not mention any names but reports suggest that he is pushing for his close aide, Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei, to succeed him, even though the ultimate decision about the country's future president lies with Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Digarban.com, a website that focuses on hard-line blogs and websites, reports that Ahmadinejad had predicted a week before the disputed June 2009 presidential vote that he would be the winner of the election.

The Iranian president said on March 16 that before the vote he had told his supporters that a major event would take place.

"I kept saying before the 2009 election that a big event is on the way," Ahmadinejad said. "After the vote someone came and asked me, 'What was the big event?' I said, 'Is there any event bigger than this?!'"

The former mayor of Tehran and a relatively unknown figure, Ahmadinej... >>>