The main job of the banks in Iran is money laundering and circumventing the global sanctions in favor of the supreme leader’s goals, Iran experts say.
And how they are completing this target is by robbing from the people’s pockets to fill the government’s budget deficit hole. Of course, at the cost of the large interest, they receive from the government.
The protests of the people in front of the banks speak volumes about this situation. And this reality has been reflected even in the reactions and the speeches of the officials.
Ehsan Khandouzi, the economy minister, on August 31 while criticizing the banking system said: “The banking system prefers the collateral of the rich to the poor. And it cuts financial resources from those who need it most. Because, as a rule, those groups do not have the necessary documents to obtain facilities. The current form of the banking business is not only indifferent to inequality, rich and poor but it can be said that it prefers the rich to the poor.”
Unfortunately, he fails to reveal the real identity of those 10 percent which are the regime’s elements and officials who are preferred to the 90 percent, which are the people, by the banking system.
He does not say that while according to the government’s statistics center, the number of homes in the country is almost equal to the number of households, why should more than half of the Iranian households be tenants. And many are becoming homeless such as the cardboard sleepers, the grave sleepers, and finally the rooftop sleepers.
He does not speak about the role of the banks in the housing crisis. More importantly, what is the share of the regime’s leaders and repressive institutions in the banks? From the police force to the Revolutionary Guards, the Basij, the army, and the infamous Ministry of Intelligence, in addition to those with their independent banks, they share many banks.
Ahmad Naderi, an MP, on September 1, in an interview with the state-TV Channel One, said: “Yes, some of the briberies were approved and became public. For example, a bag full of (gold) coins was given to the former director-general of the Central Bank. And there are many such examples.”
Again, this official does not reveal the rest of the corruption by the officials, too. To have a vision about the amount of corruption and looting in Iran, it is enough to mention the speeches of Agha Ali Eslami, one of the first commanders of the regime’s terrorist IRGC Quds Force, as he in a gathering called ‘Islamic Banking’ said:
“Iran’s national net income growth in 2020 has decreased by about 34% compared to 2007. Iran’s GDP is currently $300bn.”
In this way, such a devastating reduction, or better said looting and destruction, provides a clear vision of the amount of looting in more than four decades of the disgraceful rule of the mullahs, while the banks had the leading role in this loss.
