This is, like most things that Rouhani says, a lie. Just days prior, fully equipped riot police that was sent to Iran’s Haft Tapeh sugar factory to suppress the calls of the striking workers, who are merely asking for their wages to be paid, through any means necessary including violence and arrest.
What’s more, Rouhani’s comments about the economy also mean nothing to the Iranian people or even the leaders of his own faction. Many loyal Rouhani supporters have come out to decry this optimistic idea.
Hossein Kamali, the former labour minister, said: “I once told the president that we suffer from losing the trust in us. Trust is the greatest social asset. Our officials have talked but acted differently.”
On November 16 Kamali acknowledged to a Keyhan newspaper that there is widespread discontent about the regime from the Iranian people, something that could well cause the next Iranian revolution.
He said: “Where else in the world [do you witness that] when problems and issues occur, and protests happen, it targets the ideologic foundations of the country. Why do our officials allow the problems and issues to be blamed on Islam, the regime and the leadership [meaning specifically the Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei]?”
While Rouhani tries to point to a stable currency and gold market as proof that US sanctions haven’t worked, Arman newspaper, which is close to the Rouhani faction, has exposed the Regime’s deception. In a report, they cited analysts who said that the Regime artificially increased the currency and gold prices in order to create a bubble that would then be burst after the sanctions to show that Iran is not dependent on other nations.
While Majid Hariri, a government official in the Iranian trade chamber, said that the reasons for increases or decreases in the value of the currency were much more to do with political issues than economic ones.
Jahan-e Sanat, another paper close to the so-called moderates, said: “It’s always the government’s political play that has the last say and the economy always surrenders to the country’s politicians’ desires. Therefore, controlling the currency value isn’t an inspiring policy and can even be a sign of the country’s damaged economic climate.”
While Mohammadqoli Yousefi, an economist close to Rouhani’s faction, challenged Rouhani’s claim that the Iranian people have become more optimistic and advised that “there is neither a sign of economic stability in the country”.
He said: “Since the government’s economic policies aimed at circumventing the people… and since [the people] don’t see any benefits from the government’s economic war, they won’t be willing to share enough of the current situation and bear this much of economic hardship.”
