Party Leader Says Tragedy Awaits Iran If Economic Crisis Is Not Tackled
The leader of Iran’s centrist Executives of Construction Party, Hossein Marashi says only the Supreme Leader can confront and solve the current economic crisis.
The leader of Iran’s centrist Executives of Construction Party, Hossein Marashi says only the Supreme Leader can confront and solve the current economic crisis.
He highlighted that the annual inflation rate has jumped from 40 to 60 percent during Ebrahim Raisi’s first year in office, and the vast majority of people face incredibly hard financial conditions.
Raisi, a hardliner cleric, with no relevant experience, became president in early August 2021, with the support of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and his loyal followers among the military and conservatives.
Marashi, who is a regime loyalist but with business and technocratic background, in an interview with Didban Iran [Iran Monitor] news website on Monday, argued that the Islamic Republic needs to return to its senses and only Khamenei can make this happen.
The current 60 percent inflation figure is based on an optimistic assessment, he noted, adding that pessimists in Iran say annual inflation is over 100 percent. Marashi maintained that Iran’s problems, highlighted by its economic crisis, is beyond the powers of other officials, including the president or parliament to solve.
“No one other than Khamenei can rescue Iran from this crisis,” Marashi sai
d. The remark implicitly hints that Khamenei as top decision maker in major foreign policy, political and economic matters, is responsible for the current crisis.
The main issue dominating debate in the wider Iranian circles is about the nuclear program and the resulting United States’ sanctions that have exacerbated the difficult economic situation. Khamenei is seen as the only real decision-maker on the nuclear issue.
Meanwhile, Marashi ruled out Raisi’s occasional remarks about the former government of President Hassan Rouhani being responsible for Iran’s problems, adding that “Raisi is a non-expert in executive affairs and makes many such uncalculated comments.” Instead, Marashi largely blamed the Raisi administration and particularly his former Labor Minister Hojjat Abdolmaleki’s manipulation of the annual budget bill.
In another development, reformist Ali Mohammad Namazi said in an interview with the conservative Nameh News website that frequent protests in Iran indicate dissent and dissatisfaction. He suggested that Raisi Administration officials should have sat down with the top executives of the previous government to determine the root cause of Iran's problems and focus on solving them rather instead of simply baling their predecessors for all problems form a whole year.
Namazi criticized the Raisi administration for the effective devaluation of the Iranian currency and price rises for medicine, housing and everything else. Iran’s currency is near its all-time low of 320,000 rials to the US dollar, a more than 25-percent drop just since March.
He further criticized the government for its broken promises in the areas of housing and employment. The Raisi administration had promised to build one million apartments and create one million jobs every year. Namazi said that even one-tenth of this promise has not materialized.
Meanwhile he criticized the government's foreign policy, saying that "there is every indication that the talks aimed at reviving the 2015 nuclear deal will not be fruitful, adding that it looks like…either the [UN Security Council] trigger mechanism will be activated, which means even more sanctions, or Iran will be facing a military attack in the future."
Vahid Ashtari, a young man who is a member of Edalat Khahan [Justice Seekers], a political group of mainly university students who are loyal to Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, released a video on social media on Sunday, July 24, to warn others that whistle-blowing could be costly.
Ashtari also posted a court ruling based on which he has been sentenced to two years in jail for "spreading lies and disturbing the public's peace of mind." However, he said that he was never officially indicted.
In April this year, Ashtari revealed that the family of Majles (parliament) Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf had visited to Turkey to buy baby clothes and accessories for Ghalibaf's daughter who was pregnant at the time. He also claimed that Ghalibaf’s wife, daughter and son-in-law arrived at Tehran’s Imam Khomeini airport from Istanbul with apparently a large layette set they bought from Turkey. People at the airport didn’t recognize them at first but when a photo of the family circulated on social media, their identity was revealed.
The accusations were followed by a barrage of criticism, and resurfacing of other alleged corruption cases against the family including spending hefty amounts on purchasing properties in Istanbul. Ghalibaf's family and some of the country's officials and political figures initially denied the report but after a while they gradually confirmed Ashtari's account.
Earlier, Ashtari and his colleagues in the Justice Seekers group had made revelations about the role of one of President Ebrahim Raisi's relatives, Meysam Nili, in giving government jobs to people close to them, and called the case "Meysam Gate."
In his video and social media posts on Sunday, Ahtari welcomed his arrest and questioning at police stations, security organizations and courtrooms and said "It is good that young hardliners go to these places and find out what happens to activist workers and teachers and see the true nature of the religious political system 43 years after the 1979 Islamic revolution."
He called on Hezbollahis [hardline political activists who support the Islamic Republic and its leader] to pay special attention to this case and read the ruling.
Ashtari said: "Even after reading it, you may still not understand it because it is not a court ruling. It is a political editorial. But if your objective is to reform the appearance of the religious political system, you can see for yourself the true nature of the regime and how Islam works in the Judiciary and security system."
He "suggested to the devoted youths who blindly defend everything in the regime to find out what is going on behind the façade of Islam, sanctities and martyrs the officials take advantage of." However, he promised that "the situation in Iran will not remain like this."
The court ruling shows that Ashtari has also been accused of "discrediting state officials and mudslinging against them, portraying the country in a bad light and ridiculing a headline in Khamenei's official website."
Iranian analyst Ehsan Mehrabi told Iran International TV in London that although an official indictment has not been issued and Ashtari is entitled to an appeal, the reason why he has been given the jail sentence is that powerful officials wanted to send a message to all that no one, even a well-known conservative figure devoted to Khamenei, can get away with levelling accusations against regime insiders.
Iravani, who will replace Majid Takht-Ravanchi, served as a deputy of Shamkhani, the secretary of Iran's Supreme National Security Council (SNSC), for nine years. Majid Takht-Ravanchi was among the last officials appointed by former foreign minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, who led the Iranian negotiations with P5+1 countries which produced the 2015 nuclear deal – or the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action.
Iravani also served as Iran’s chargé d'affaires in Iraq and secretary of Iran’s Strategic Council on Foreign Relations. He has career overlaps with current lead nuclear negotiator Ali Bagheri-Kani – as both served as SNSC deputies. He is the first Iranian ambassador to the UN with extensive SNSC experience. Iravani's diplomatic assignments -- spearheading the Saudi-Iranian dialogue in Baghdad and his experience as chargé d'affaires -- have been more regionally focused than his predecessors to date.
President Ebrahim Raisi also appointed new ambassadors to six countries – Georgia, India, Lebanon, Czech Republic, Poland, and Sierra Leone -- on Sunday, practically cleansing the diplomatic roster of appointees from the administration of former president Hassan Rouhani. A cleric, Khalil Sadati Amiri, was named as Iran's ambassador to Sierra Leone.
Moreover, Raisi appointed Ali Bahraini as Tehran’s permanent representative to the UN Office and other international organizations in Geneva.
