In recent weeks, many protests have taken place across Iran because of society’s agitation at the Iranian regime’s lack of attempts to resolve the current social and economic crises in Iran.
On Tuesday, retirees from Iran’s Health Ministry held protests in cities across Iran demanding that they receive their delayed pensions and bonuses that the regime has refused to adjust to fit the rising inflation rate.
On September 3, just before the start of the new academic year, Iranian teachers began the first of many protests in response to the lack of employment opportunities and low salaries.
The NCRI said, “There have been many protests by the green report card teachers, who have passed the Education Ministry’s employment test. Still, the regime has so far refused to employ them despite the shortage of teachers across Iran.”
The regime is not adjusting pensions and salaries to fit with the current economic situation. Wages were increased in April to 39% but considering the rising inflation rate since then, the rise is nowhere near enough for people to comfortably live on.
In a quote from Ali Aslani from the board of directors of Islamic Labor Councils, the Kar-o Kargar daily wrote, “A 39% increase in salaries in 2021 will cover only 37 percent of the people’s cost of living. A worker’s salary of 4 million Tomans covers only ten days of the month, and after that, the workers barely make ends meet until the end of the month. They have to remove many of the basic expenses of their lives.”
According to the state-run media and officials, Iran’s poverty line is estimated to be around 10 million tomans. Meanwhile, the salary base is 3.9 million tomans.
Etemad daily explained that according to the Statistics Center of Iran, the estimated poverty line figure sits between 11 and 12 million tomans, but many teachers earn less than half of that.
According to Article 41 of the regime’s labor law, it states that ‘salaries should be adjusted with the inflation rate’ and that wages ‘should be enough to provide the minimum of a life.”
In other words, the regime could help Iranians by at least implementing its labor law. But as time passes, it becomes clearer that the clerical regime is not willing to help Iranians.
To date, Ebrahim Raisi, the regime’s new president, along with his administration has yet to establish a plan to resolve the economic issues faced by Iranians or to combat the rising inflation rates. During his tours around the country following his inauguration in August, Raisi has only offered false promises to Iranian citizens, claiming that, “if God wills,” the problems would be resolved!”
Etemad daily stated in their September 28 publication that many of the problems that need to be resolved to need clear legislation to overcome them and they believe that Raisi either lacks the will or the ability to assign tasks that need to be completed to advance the efforts to resolve the crises.
In fact, Raisi’s government is handpicked by the regime’s Supreme Leader for consolidating power in the regime through terrorism and domestic oppression. The regime’s oppression is aimed to reduce protests and control Iran’s restive society.
