Shahrokh Ahkami —
Persian Heritage, winter 2023, #110 —
With the arrival of the Christian New Year and departure of a year filled with horror, war, destruction, oppression, poverty, and despair, I extend my heartfelt greetings to our loyal readers of Persian Heritage, to dear friends and companions and to advocates of peace and harmony. I hope the New Year serves as a healing balm for the deep and painful wounds of the people throughout the world.
A friend asked me to speak and write about friendship, kindness, joy, and merriment in “A Word with the Readers.” Accepting this suggestion proved so difficult and impossible that I responded with tear-filled eyes and a trembling, hesitant voice: “How can one entertain oneself and their readers with humor, jest, and pleasant conversation in the face of such adversity, injustice, crime, massacre, and ruthlessness, falsehood, and deception?” My friend withdrew, leaving me with a cold farewell, without a word, to my harsh and sharp response.
Unfortunately, every time the final days of the pages of “Mirass-e-Iran” approach, the publication is delayed due to my part hoping and anticipating positive changes in Iran’s circumstances. Then the pressure builds up to print the magazine. This compels me to pick up the pen and once again write these lines under the influence of conditions filled with pain, hardship, bitterness, and despair, regret, and concern. Theft, embezzlement, corruption by shameless officials, and the ruling elite’s lavish lifestyle is destroying Iran. Iran with its human and natural resources could be a leading country in the world, yet these shameless leaders, instead, have emptied the national treasury. Under the pretext of sanctions, they continually oppress and impoverish the people. They solve their financial problems by raising the prices of the dollar and foreign currencies daily, without holding the thieves accountable.
For anyone reading the daily news of Iran, hearing about the embezzlement of 3.4 billion dollars, by the owners of the Debsh Tea Company importing low-quality and worthless African teas instead of Ceylon and Indian tea, and creating a fuss in an effort to divert the people’s minds from their demands and needs. The government neglects to prosecute and punish the thieves and gradually let the issue fade into oblivion.
African teas instead of Indian tea reminds me of my university days. With two friends from the same city, one like me a student and the other an army officer, we were heading home in the darkness of the night when a man on a bicycle stopped in front of us. He pulled a package of tea from the bag behind his bicycle and by opening the package, said to our officer friend, “Lieutenant, I’ve taken this tea from my work instead of my wage. It’s very high quality. By buying this tea you will make my wife and children happy.”
After the Lieutenant smelled the tea and liked it. We each bought several packages of tea from the cyclist, emptied his full bag, and arrived home, thinking we helped the cyclist and his family. At a friend’s house, the Lieutenant’s friend was waiting, and as soon as he saw the teas, he started mocking us. By boiling and making the tea from it sipping a bit of that tea, he showed us that what we had bought was tea dust. I still wonder to this day how one can easily take advantage of the simplicity and good intentions of individuals and easily deceive them. This is exactly like the behavior of the incompetent, unscrupulous, stealing, and cunning rulers who, as quickly as possible, are emptying the national treasury and filling their personal accounts in the banks of the Persian Gulf, Canada, and other Western countries.
The problem of the people of Iran is not just unemployment, poverty, and destitution. There are families with meager pensions of a deceased father or spouse, supporting two or three dependent families, namely the spouse, children, and descendants who, due to unemployment or illness, must survive with a meager retirement income of a deceased person. Do they not have a sense or feeling and obligation to extend a hand to those who suffer?
Sometimes, I question in my mind whether the government and rulers are being incompetent or intentionally engage everyone by creating these problems. When the head of the family leaves home in the morning, all his concerns are about how to bring bread to the table for his spouse and children. If they don’t receive their wages or find a job, how should he return home at night?
One and a half years ago when the “Women, Life, Freedom” movement began, many Iranians, including Mahsas, young people, and teenagers, stood up for a simple and human demand: the freedom to choose clothing, express opinions, and practice their religion and beliefs. In this movement, generations over 30 were not seen in the crowds of protesters. It was the third generations post revolution who had taken up the banners demanding freedom. We saw that every day many young people continue to be executed on various pretexts such as theft, corruption, etc. Iran has set a shameful record in the world with the increasing number of these executions, surpassing China, the United States, the Emirates and Saudi Arabia, which were once leaders in shameless executions.
Today, the Chinese Foreign Minister, at a banquet while holding a glass of wine, stated that there is no solution other than having friendly relations and coexistence with the United States. In other words, Communist China, an ideological, political, and economic rival to the United States, still not the world’s number one in terms of economic-industrial and military power, is explaining and recommending to have a co-existent relationship with rivals such as United States, in contrast to what we have witnessed in Iran over the past forty years.
The incompetent rulers have done whatever possible to strengthen their position and maintain their dominance and power. Blowing the horn against their number one enemy, the United States, and then calling for the destruction of Israel, for over forty years, has yielded nothing but the destruction of the country’s industrial and economic foundations, its natural resources, and production. The increasing pressure on people’s lives and the use of threatening language have not yielded any achievements for their people. Instead, massive amounts of capital have been spent in the past 40 years in foreign Arab countries such as Syria, Yemen, Lebanon, Palestine, and Iraq, building schools, medical centers, providing electricity and energy to Iraq, water to Kuwait, etc., leading to financial pressure, poverty, and shortages for the people of Iran.
In the given statistics, over 900,000 children have dropped out of school and the poverty rate has grown over 40%.
In recent events in the Middle East Arab countries have remained silent. Erdogan, the cunning and clever politician of Turkey, has not taken any action but offers one or two slogans and artificial empathy. However, the leaders of the Islamic government, from the first day started shouting slogans and readiness for war, creating noises that serve as an excuse for the U.S. and Israel to think about an attack similar to Iraq or Afghanistan. Every day, with threats and condemning Iran for proxy involvement in the war, they prepare public opinion in the United States for the possibility of such an attack. Just as during the attack on Iraq, they entered the war with such deceit and plan. Despite all the claims they had, they handed Saddam’s head to the gallows leaving his country divided.
A few days ago, on the anniversary of Qasem Soleimani’s death, in Kerman, over hundreds of our compatriots were killed and nearly 200 were injured in a shocking terrorist incident. First of all, I express my condolences to the people of Iran, especially the families who lost their loved ones, and wish the injured a speedy recovery. After this incident, the United States and Israel claimed in the first minutes that they had no hand in this incident. The Islamic Republic of Iran pointed its accusing finger at Israel. Almost two days later, ISIS took responsibility for these attacks in an announcement by publishing two unrecognizable photos. However, a part of the people, due to their difficult conditions and the government’s neglect of their hardships, as well as corruption in various ranks of the government and the large-scale thefts that occur every day from the public wealth of this country, have lost trust in the government to the point that they are willing to accept that this horrific incident was also the work of the Islamic Republic. Just as in the terrorist operation Shah Cheragh in Shiraz during the peak of the Women, Life, Freedom movement, which led to the deaths of more than ten people, some people said that the act was their own doing.
The relationship between the people and their government has deteriorated so much that even individuals like Mr. Khomeini’s grandson admits it. Although Hassan Khomeini claimed with the repetition of empty and clichéd phrases: “… these bloods strengthen the roots of security in our country; because it creates national cohesion… Yesterday’s incident in Kerman… will not cause insecurity but will increase security…,” he later confessed with conservative language that the insecurity in the country stems from people’s dissatisfaction with life. When people are not in harmony with the government, such events can happen again. He said: “The biggest factor in ensuring security in the country is the harmony of society with the government… You think the first ring around a person, an institution, or a building is the guards of the border number one?! No, protection of the border and beyond begins. But do not think that only that border guard provides security; the villager who has agriculture at the border provides security; the tradesman who has a shop in the border city, if he is in harmony with you, provides security. Anyone who lives in the lower or upper streets of the city, if he is sympathetic to the government, is like a security officer and, like a nail in the solid structure of the country”.
In fact, the story of the Islamic Republic is the story of a lying shepherd with his crying wolf. Deception, lies, filling their pockets with billions of embezzled dollars, moral corruption against the people, interference in peoples private and personal affairs, and the issuance of harsh punishment for trivial crimes have shaken the people’s trust. So much has the trust been shaken that even when the leaders speak the truth they are not believed. Now, the leader of the Islamic Republic claims that it is the language of God, and what God tells him is what he says to his audience! But the leader himself knows well that this method of oligarchy has greatly weakened people’s belief in God and God’s religion and no longer believes in such claims.
Once again, my heartfelt wish is for peace and security in the world for everyone and that prosperity and happiness for the oppressed people of Iran will prevail. Hoping for those days.