According to recent reports, by the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), and the People’s Mujahedin of Iran (PMOI / MEK Iran), Iranian social security retirees and pensioners staged protests throughout the country. On Sunday, retirees, and pensioners protesting their miserable economic conditions and chanting anti-regime slogans, “we have heard too many lies, we will no longer vote,” “Threats and crackdown are no longer effective.”
These protests were the 9th nationally by Iranian retirees in the last three months and the first in the new Persian Year of 1400. Despite the strong atmosphere of repression in Iran, pensioners took the streets on Sunday even though, the regime attempted, but failed, to threaten protesters and discourage them from participating in the demonstrations.
Pensioners organized rallies outside local social security offices in Tehran, Arak, Ardabil, Isfahan, Ahvaz, Ilam, Khorramabad, Rasht, Sari, Sanandaj, Shiraz, Karaj, Kerman, Kermanshah, Gorgan, Qazvin, Mashhad, Yazd, Neyshabur, Shush, Shooshtar, and Abhar.
The protests and slogans of the pensioners represent the society’s bottled-up anger at the regime and its corrupted structures. Officials from the government and the state-run media have recognized the tumultuous state of the nation and the people’s economic grievances. On Sunday, Abbas Akhundi, the regime’s former Minister of Urban and Road Developments, said, “Inflation burns people to their core.”
“People’s tables continue to shrink daily. If we do not find a solution, great damage will await us. The feeling of oppression among the people who lost their [life savings in] stock market, [people’s anger of] incidents, [such as] the fuel-price hike incident [November 2019 uprising], the rampant inflation, the long ques for oil and poultry, cannot be ignored. People will react at the right time,” declared Ahmad Alireza Beigy, former MP, on Sunday.
“The truth is the inflation in the country has increased by 35% within the last year, and the prices of most products people need have tripled,” read the state-run Arman daily on Saturday, adding, “In the current situation, workers are living in inadequate economic conditions. Many shop owners have a customer downturn.”
“On the other hand, unemployment is increasing daily in society. The situation is such that private companies are either partially closed or forced to fire their employees.” Arman writes, concluding, “As a result, the recent rise in prices has infuriated people, and society is on the verge of the explosion. If this doesn’t happen now, it will happen soon”.
After a year of fighting the ongoing Covid-19 outbreak, protests from all walks of life resurfaced in Iran in the winter of 2021.
These daily protests show that the government, with all of its repressive forces, cannot contain protests because doing so would enrage people even more and intensify their hate for the regime.
If the regime does not react, the protests will spread across Iran, reminding the regime of the November 2019 uprising, which shook the regime to its core.
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