Domestic issues dog Tehran as it negotiates with Washington

Iran hopes to resolve its biggest foreign affairs challenge through talks with the United States at the same time it grapples with some of the toughest domestic problems in the Islamic Republic's nearly 50-year history.

Some commentators and former officials say the government of Masoud Pezeshkian is unable to resolve even the simplest domestic political issues that could improve the lives of ordinary Iranians.

One example, noted by centrist politician and former presidential candidate Mostafa Hashemi-Taba, is the failure to adopt daylight saving time to help with Iran's energy crisis.

Iran's parliament recently discussed the importance of the measure, but lawmakers refused to prioritize the bill, with Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf joking that the matter would be taken up at a later date.

In an interview with the news website Rouydad24, Hashemi-Taba attributed such failures to a "lack of rationality" in governance.

"The government has no principles when it comes to addressing problems," he said, accusing officials of resorting to empty slogans instead of practical solutions, and engaging in futile debates until a new crisis diverts attention from unresolved issues.

"There is no public participation in Iran. Only a select group of people make decisions," Hashemi-Taba said.

Another stalled initiative is changing the weekend from Thursday–Friday to Saturday–Sunday to facilitate international commerce.

Despite months of debate in parliament and other government offices, the measure—deemed necessary by some economists—has been dismissed by some lawmakers with bizarre arguments.

Any weekend change, some critics have asserted, could hinder population growth, since Iranians traditionally conceive children on Thursday nights, and a Saturday–Sunday weekend would disrupt this pattern, as people would have to work on Fridays.

Meanwhile, more pressing issues, such as water and energy shortages, remain unresolved.

Tehran's freshwater resources stand at just 14% of their usual levels, according to official statistics, prompting the capital's governor to declare a water shortage emergency last week.

The government has not managed to find a solution, instead proposing to divert water from other regions—an approach that could cause shortages elsewhere.

Civil unrest erupted in the historic city of Isfahan last week, as residents took matters into their own hands by blocking the flow of water from the Zayandeh Rood River to neighboring Yazd Province.

Electricity is in short supply too, causing regular power cuts in the capital and other regions. Officials have released a blackout schedule, but people say it lacks clarity, leaving them to discover outages only when they are plunged into darkness.

"Fake experts make all the wrong decisions and prevent a minority of true experts from solving problems," prominent sociologist Taqi Azad Armaki told the news website Fararu.

The problem, Armaki argued, is that the government cannot compile or prioritize the crises it faces, as those making crucial decisions lack expertise and are disconnected from what the people want.

"The majority of our society desires peace, jobs and engagement with the world, free from constant worry," Armaki said. "This group constitutes approximately 90 percent of the population. But there is a 5-percent minority that opposes such a lifestyle.

"Those elected to parliament with the support of this minority are louder and disproportionately influential," he added. "The country's resources have been distributed unfairly and unevenly between these two groups."