On September 8, 1978, during an incident known as Black Friday, the Shah of Iran authorized the executions of at least 100 Iranians. A year later when the Shah was overthrown, the founder of the Iranian regime Ruhollah Khomeini expressed his mind about the economy and future of Iran.
These days, no one would dare repeat his absorbing comments about the relationship between man and the economy, due to the insulting nature of his address to the nation.
He claimed, “Those who consider the economy the basis of everything also considers humans as animals. The animal sacrifices everything for its economy. For a donkey, the economy is the basis of everything.”
43 years after this brazen speech and looking at the country’s economic situation under siege, it shows us a clear picture of what the regime has done to the country and its people. Just a glance at the price of dollars, gold coins, and the skyrocketing prices of food brings forth the realization that most Iranians are now being forced to live in extreme poverty.
According to the state-run Setareh-e Sobh daily, “The price of gold in the second week of December hit a new record. So, the price of an eight-gram Bahar-e Azadi coin reached 180,400,000 rials ($462.27), a four-gram coin jumped from 80 million rials to 120 million rials ($301.48) and a two-gram coin jumped from 60 million rials to 80 million rials ($200.99). Also, the price of the dollar in the open market has reached 380 thousand rials.”
The regime’s Ministry of Industry, Mine and Trade recently published the latest statistics on price changes, according to which the prices of around 29 goods, including oil and rice, have increased by more than 100 percent.
A further 28 goods have increased in price between 50 and 100 percent, and 30 goods have increased by about 50 percent. The details of the published statistics indicate that liquid oil has had a shocking 377 percent increase in price, while rice has increased by 207 percent compared to last year.
The October report from the regime’s Statistics Center showed that the price of first-class Iranian rice and pasta has increased by 138 percent, and the price of milk and cheese has increased by nearly 90 percent when compared to last year.
We should add these economic issues to the back-breaking rental prices across the country, along with the price of fruit, clothes, and school supplies. Over the past four decades, the regime has achieved nothing and has done nothing for the people other than cause widespread destruction.
As one of the regime’s experts, Hamidreza Jalalipour stated, “The 1979 revolution and the Islamic Republic that emerged from it are facing an ‘achievement crisis’. The governing institutions in the past forty years have not yet been able to achieve the goals of the 1979 revolution.”
Mohammad Ali Vakili, the editorial writer of the Ebtekar daily, warned the regime’s head about the consequences of the critical economic conditions and said, “Governing in this unstable and chaotic society is very difficult. I think the government is dealing with such a society. Perhaps one of the reasons for forming such a protesting society is the achievement crisis.”
He added, “If the economic conditions do not change, there is enough excuse for widespread protests. Therefore, the protesting society should not be brought to the peak of the explosion.”
The regime’s president Ebrahim Raisi once again repeated one of his hollow promises to the Iranian people in one of the country’s most deprived regions (South Khorasan).
While admitting to Ibn that “the public sector has not had a successful experience in the economic sector in the past 43 years”, regarding the promise of building one million housing units he said, “Land is available, and construction materials are being prepared. In this province, in the parts where it is possible to transfer (land), land should be offered to the applicants in the form of villas.”
In response, Pedram Soltani, an economist and the former vice president of the regime’s Chamber of Commerce, mocked Raisi stating, “Land and materials?! See the president’s level of analysis! He does not know that the main problem is the lack of financial resources and financing such a level of construction fits not the government’s finances, nor the capacity of the banking system and the capital market.”
The reason for such a catastrophic situation is simple and does not warrant much analysis. As explained by Hossein Raghfar, one of the regime’s experts, he said, “They have formed a kleptocratic economy that distributes bank credits to friends and comrades. To compensate for the looted resources from the banks, they increased the currency and coin rates.”
He added, “Easily said, 76 tons or according to other sources, 62 tons of the country’s gold were melted and given to the banks so that they could compensate for the thefts by selling the coins at a higher price. For 20 years, we have been facing the disaster of capital flight from the country, and this is increasing massively every year.”
