These days, the Iranian regime is faced with rallies and strikes of different unions related to livelihood challenges, from the teachers’ unions to the retirees, on a daily basis. According to the regime’s officials, following the 2019 protests, the regime has lost its credibility among the people, and an indicator of this is the endless protests.
Regime experts have said that due to the increasing inflation, public poverty, and the failure to reach an outcome in the JCPOA negotiations, the regime is likely to face much larger and more dangerous protests in the near future.
Morteza Ofoghe, one of the regime’s experts, said that “if the politicians continue the same trend, they will face new and more challenging political and social issues between the people and the rule.”
Some economic experts have recently warned the regime’s president Ebrahim Raisi and their weak government that there is a huge distance between reality and what this group has claimed about their economic changes. Raisi and his economic ministers have been routinely mocked for continuing to give hollow promises rather than improving the economic situation, which is just worsening the problem.
The truth of the matter is that Mohamad Mokhber, the first vice president, is completely unknowledgeable when it comes to the economy, and the regime’s head of the budget planning organization and the head of the Central Bank have not studied economics at all. None of them have a clue about how to solve the issues that the regime has created.
They thought that they could turn the country’s economy upside down, but, because of the huge corruption in the government, changes have become impossible, despite their claim that the economic problems are in relation to the uncertainty of the JCPOA.
This failure in curbing the economic problems is the reason why the regime has increased the number of executions, intensified its repression of Iranian citizens, raised the issue of compulsory hijab, and launched a major crackdown. Despite the regime’s imagination that these tactics will secure them from major protests and nationwide uprisings, many of its experts and officials have warned about the consequences their decisions will cause.
Abbas Abdi, another one of the regime’s experts, wrote on his Twitter account, “Regarding the behavior of the Ershad (Guidance) patrol with teenage girls, I can say and think that sooner or later one of these encounters will unintentionally lead to an unpleasant situation. I think it is necessary for the police force to get a serious assessment of this issue and the possibilities ahead, maybe these encounters must be reconsidered.”
While warning the regime not to enforce mandatory hijab, Fayaz Zahed, a regime journalist, said that the creators of the hijab plan are committing malicious actions to divert people’s attention because they are unable to solve the main problems within society.
In his interview with the state-run daily Etemad on July 23, he added, “The experience of 2018 (protests) showed how dangerous these artificial crises (such as the hijab plan) could be and become a weapon against the system. Iranian society is angry. Don’t mess with people’s girls.”
The former oil minister of the regime, Mohammad Gharazi, admitted to the increase in repression, which is aimed at curbing the explosive situation in society. He warned the regime of its social consequences in his interview with the state-run daily Mostaghel on July 25, saying, “What has happened in the country is that governments have always misused public rights in favor of a special group. That is, instead of respecting public rights, they have imposed the rights of political power. Some politicians believe that the gap between the government and the people has increased, and this has cost the system a lot.”
He concluded, “What factors do you think caused this gap? Instead of sticking to the government, the political power should consider the rule of the society. For example, inflation is against the administration of the country. Inflation has reached skyrocketing numbers, shrinking the livelihoods of people. What is the solution? Inflation is really heavy.”
