From Sunday to Tuesday, pensioners returned to the streets again, shouting “Pensioner dies but does not accept humiliation,” in Tehran, Kermanshah, Arak, Shush, and Ahvaz, and other cities.
While chanting, “Expensive, inflation, the scourge of the people,” “Social Security, what a wrong name” and “bankrupt government is the enemy of retirees,” the retirees displayed their anger against the government of Ebrahim Raisi and a regime that is wrought with discrimination and looting.
In Ahvaz, a large number of retirees gathered in front of the offices of Social Security Organization of this city and by shouting “We will not live under oppression, we sacrifice our lives in the path of freedom, death to this slavery, death to this slavery,” they challenged the regime and the bankrupt government of Raisi.
The cry of deprived pensioners, who demand their plundered salaries after a lifetime of work and effort, is while for years, the regime has been stealing from pension funds for nefarious goals. The pension funds are suffering from a “mega crisis” due to the regime’s looting and corruption. On October 7, the state-run Ham Mihan newspaper wrote, “The Iranian society faces a number of mega-challenges that are increasing their dimensions and limiting their solvency over time. Challenges such as the state of the banking system, the state of water and natural resources, the environment, unemployment, the imbalance of the budget, and one of the most important of these are pension funds.”
The crisis of pension funds is rooted in the theft of people’s funds and the systematic corruption of the government and entities affiliated with Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. One of the regime’s experts, Saeed Laylaz, wrote in Ensaf News on July 11, 2018: “The crisis of Social Security funds is organized. It is a crisis that systematically stole or destroyed what was in the funds.”
On 8 May 2023, the state-run newspaper Etemad, referring to the volume of trade of state-backed looters with people’s funds, wrote: “The government has a total debt of 5,010 trillion rials (approx. $10 billion) to pension funds. Even if all oil revenues return to the country, it is not possible to pay the principal and dues of these debts easily.”
The scandal of stealing from the sole source of income for millions of deprived households reached the point where on May 3, 2023, the government website Khabar Online wrote with a bold headline: “Pension funds have become the backyard of politicians,” and the deposed Director General of Social Insurance of the Ministry of Labor said on May 2, 2023: “Even if we sell 3 million barrels of oil [per day] without sanctions and receive all the money, we still cannot solve the crisis of retirees. We might need to sell Qeshm and Kish [Islands] to pay pensions.”
And today, the retirees all over the country, who had worked hard for years and received their salaries in constant deductions, so that they could provide their minimum livelihoods in old age, have reached the point of explosion.
The noble retirees who lived a life of dignity today clearly see that the fruits of their lives have become a playground and backyard of corrupt government officials, and today they have reached the line of misery. This is a line that is no longer tolerable due to the increasing inflation and rising prices, healthcare problems and other social crises and challenges that have become intertwined.
The government-run Ham Mihan newspaper continues the discussion by admitting that in the current corrupt structure, there is no prospect of getting out of the current crisis, and referring to the compounding of crises, writes: “None of Iran’s mega-challenges, including the mega challenge of pension funds, can be solved. In other words, these mega-challenges are somehow intertwined with each other and require a comprehensive political and inclusive solution beyond expert methods to solve each one. Without such a solution, crises will deepen and widen, and their solutions will become more limited and ineffective.”
It is not without reason that today, the retirees who should have a life and quiet and carefree days after 30 years of hard work, boldly stand up to the regime, do not submit to the “slavery” of the ruling looters and demand their rights on the streets.
