Iran’s newly elected president will be sworn in at the beginning of August after receiving a letter of endorsement from the country’s supreme leader.

The inauguration ceremony for president-elect Masoud Pezeshkian will be held either on August 4 or August 5, Iranian state media quoted Mojtaba Yousifi, a member of the parliament’s presiding board, as saying on Sunday.

Yousefi added that Pezeshkian will then be given a period of 15 days to choose his ministerial cabinet and submit it to the parliament for approval.

Reformist candidate Masoud Pezeshkian was elected as Iran’s new president on Saturday, beating hardliner Saeed Jalili by almost 3 million votes.

According to Iranian state media, Pezeshkian polled over 16 million votes in the Friday runoff round of the presidential elections as opposed to Jalili’s 13.5 million votes. 

Participation rate was 49.8% during the runoff round with over 30.5 million voters, a nine percent increase in participation in the first round of elections.

Despite being labeled as reformist, Pezeshkian cannot bring radical reform to Iran, as the supreme leader Ayatollah Khamenei has absolute authority in the country and can reject any decisions made by the parliament or the government.

Pezeshkian’s inauguration is pending an endorsement letter from Khamenei, after which he will be eligible for a swearing in ceremony.

Pezeshkian has already served five terms in the Iranian parliament, been the country’s deputy parliamentary speaker, and served as the country’s health minister for four years under Mohammad Khatami’s term according to Iranian state media.

Iran held early elections on June 28 after a helicopter crash claimed the lives of then president Ebrahim Raisi and several Iranian officials.

These are the first presidential elections since widespread protests across the country in 2022, following the death of Kurdish woman Zhina "Mahsa" Amini in the custody of the country’s morality police. The protests were met with violent police suppression.

The elections saw a record low turnout with only 40 percent of 60 million eligible voters casting their ballots.

No candidate was able to gain the required absolute majority of votes during the first round in which Pezeshkian led the polls with over 42.5% of the votes.