Maryam Rajavi: Workers’ struggle is a major part of the Iranian people’s resistance to topple the ruling religious dictatorship/Miscellaneous National Council of Resistance of Iran

Statement by the National Council of Resistance of Iran Labor Committee on the occasion of International Workers’ Day
Sunday, 01 May 2016

Velayat-e-faqih regime (Absolute rule of clergy) is the only cause for the misery of millions of workers and toilers of Iran
Mr. Abbas Davari, chairman of the Labor Committee of the National Council of Resistance of Iran, congratulated workers across the country on the occasion of International Workers’ Day and said: “This day promises victory over the oppressors and overthrow of the mullahs’ anti-workers regime, and the establishment of popular sovereignty in our captive country. Two years and nine months after Rouhani came to power, the economic policies of the regime are still serving the interest of monopolized institutions and companies related to Khamenei and the Revolutionary Guards, and the conditions of workers and toilers have continuously deteriorated during this period. According to official statistics, domestic liquidity during Rouhani’s tenure has doubled from “500,000 billon tomans[1] to a quadrillion (1,000,000 billion) tomans[2].” Add to that its tragic effects on the lives of working people as well as the fight that is needed to tackle corruption.

Rising prices and falling wages
Despite the fact that “the committee of setting wages had stated this year’s four-person household living cost over three million and 75 thousand tomans[3]”, the Supreme Labor Council, without the presence of representatives of workers, set the minimum wage for 2016 as 812,000 tomans. This amount is about 25 percent of wage calculations as determined by the committee of setting wages. Meanwhile, Ali Rabiee, Rouhani’s Minister of Labor, a founder of the Ministry of Intelligence and notorious torturer[4], shamelessly says: “In the last three years the increase in wages outstripped the rate of inflation[5]”, while the newspaper five days earlier quoted the experts that “effective inflation on other components includes transport 40%, communications 23%, health19% and training 24% [6]”.
Last month state media reported: “The discussion to increase public transport fees in Tehran by 15 to 25% is underway, and since exponential increase of public transport fees affects other living costs, we must soon witness the declining buying power of the workers[7].”
State budget, exploitation of the working people in favor of maintaining the regime
On April 13, 2016, the clerical regime’s parliament approved the 2016 budget of Rouhani in the amount of 952 thousand billion tomans. A simple glance at the budget shows that the only thing that was not considered in it is to provide workers and toilers’ wages. Budget priority in general is to maintain the regime of velayat-e faqih and to promote suppression, export of terrorism and fundamentalism and to fill the pockets of bloodthirsty ruling mullahs and their families and dependents.
The bulk of the budget is spent on the military, security, foreign warmongering, and huge propaganda apparatus of the regime, all of which serve to repress the society. In addition, a large part of the budget with nested footnotes is spent on institutions affiliated to Khamenei and Iranian Revolutionary Guards and suppressive bodies.
Sharq state-run newspaper writes: “Despite presence of institutions such as the Islamic Propaganda Organization, Bassij and Qom Seminary and policy council of imams, in fixed budget rows, still sectors belonging to these institutions are present in the budget table[8].” The same newspaper writes: “For years a separate table has been published as attachment to the budget bill in which budgets are allocated to specific institutions and cultural centres[9].” For example, see two of the figures in this table: one related to Rafsanjani band and the other to Khamenei band.
First- In three rows name of Hassan Khomeini is given: Institute for the Publication of Khomeini’s work “16 billion and 450 million tomans”, for the preservation of monument of Khomeini “9 and a half billion tomans” and for the protocols of Khomeini’s grave “27 billion tomans”, meaning that Hassan Khomeini receives total of 52 billion and 950 million tomans from the Iranian people’s public funds.
Second – Institute of Mullah Mesbah Yazdi, in four rows under different names of the Islamic Propaganda Organization, etc. receives a total of 194 billion and 294 million tomans.
The budget does not provide for economic and social development and helping the poor. This is so obvious that Zohreh Tayyebzadeh, MP, recently said: In the past two years, “no budget was allocated by the centre to the most disadvantaged and most vulnerable sectors of women … there are families that are poised to addiction and unfortunately force their daughters to social and moral evils[10].” Farhang state-run radio – April 18, 2016).
Monopolized companies and organizations, cause of endemic poverty and unemployment.
Iranian Revolutionary Guards on the one hand controls the most important economic companies and institutions and bottlenecks of the country’s import and export at ports and airports, and on the other hand by using these facilities has become the largest smuggling network in the country. According to state-run media, “Every year more than 25 billion dollars of goods are smuggled into the country[11]”. According to the regime’s expert estimates, this amount could create more than two million jobs.
These monopolies lead to destruction of non-monopolized productions and has brought millions to the army of unemployed. So that a regime’s MP said: “60 percent of the country’s production units have become fully or partially shut down[12]”.
Iran Statistics Center has reported unemployment rate in 2015 as 2.12 percent in urban areas and 1.8 percent in rural areas. But Larijani, the Speaker of the regime’s Parliament, said: “42 percent of graduates are unemployed[13].” Al Is’haq, former Minister of Commerce and current advisor to the Ministry of Agriculture said that unemployed population is seven to eight million the majority of them educated[14]. The situation of women workers is extremely painful. “Some women workers work with one-third of actual wage[15].” Of “two million and 230 thousand women heads of the households[16]”, “82 percent are unemployed[17].” “Now we have over 10 million marginalized in the country … women comprise part of the marginalized population[18].”
Lack of job security
Lack of job security is the most important problem of the workers. The executive secretary of Mazandaran province workers’ house, said: “90% of Mazandaran workers and contract workers have no job security[19].”
Rahmatullah Pourmousa, Secretary-General of Islamic Labor Councils, said: “In Iran 94 percent of the workers work on contract basis[20]”.
Gholamreza Abbasi, president of Supreme Centre of Trade Associations, said, “95 percent of workers have no employment contract document[21].”
There is no guarantee for workers with 20 years of experience that they would not be fired. This is the biggest concern of the workers. Khamenei and Revolutionary Guards are the main cause of it since they have the bulk of large companies and factories in their monopoly and have a major role in destroying job security of the workers.
Suppression of Trade Unions
No independent labor organization is recognized by the clerical regime. In accordance with Article 138 of the labor law, “the supreme leader, if deemed appropriate can be represented in any of Trade Unions.” A representative who only is a means of suppression of workers. Members and representatives of labor organizations beyond the control of the regime are continually subjected to arrest, imprisonment and torture. However, according to the International Labor Organization Acts that the regime is among its signatories, labor organizations are among inalienable rights of workers. Just this year, on the eve of International Workers Day, in order to prevent workers’ gatherings and marches, a number of labor representatives have been arrested and a larger number have been threatened by the Ministry of Intelligence.
Workers’ Protests, rallies and sit-ins
Despite the brutal and systematic repression, Iranian workers have continued protests, sit-ins and rallies and have taken every opportunity to exercise their rights. They have risen against the lack of salary, unpaid wages, layoffs, job insecurity and plunder and exploitation of workers under the pretext of privatization. On the eve of May Day this year, by the call of the PMOI and the Iranian Resistance, these protest actions have taken a wider dimension.
Workers’ solidarity in the face of marauders and suppressive forces is very impressive. This was well manifested in the human chain of 10 thousand petrochemical workers in Mahshahr in December 2015.
What should be done with this limitless plunder and looting?
The only party that has brought misery to the Iranian workers, has made them unemployed, and has caused them ever increasing poverty, is the ominous regime of velayat-e-faqih that has responded to the minimum legitimate and legal demands of the workers with repression and torture. The rights of workers, the dispossession of Khamenei and Iranian Revolutionary Guards from Iran’s economy it is not possible without the overthrow of this regime. As the courageous struggle of the workers against inhumane and cruel abuses is an integral part of the struggle to overthrow the mullahs’ regime. This is a national duty that the Iranian Resistance along with Iranian workers and toilers and general population will materialize and establish democracy, popular sovereignty and social justice in Iran.
The Labor Committee of the NCRI urges the International Labor Organization, trade unions and syndicates and all human rights advocates around the world to condemn the anti-labor policies of the clerical regime by all possible means and defend the rights of Iranian workers. In Iran under the mullahs’ rule, all basic rights of workers such as the right to work, independent trade unions and syndicates, job security, and insurance are strongly violated and every day a large number of workers are arrested and sent to prison due to demanding these basic rights.
National Council of Resistance of Iran
Labor Committee
May 1, 2016
[1] Deputy Minister of Construction – Ressalat Newspaper, February 17, 2016
[2] President of the Central Bank – Javan Newspaper, February 14, 2016
[3] Javan Newspaper, March 6, 2016
[4] Official site of the Social Security Organization of the regime has made clear that Ali Rabiee, Rouhani’s Minister of Labor, has been “parliamentary and legal deputy of the Ministry of Intelligence” from 1987 to 1993. That is, during the massacre of political prisoners in 1988 he was deputy minister of intelligence. According to this site, Rabiee was also a “member of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps and member of Command Councils of Tehran base, district 3 in the Country and Hamzeh Seyed Al-Shohada garrison”.
[5] Vatan Emrooz, March 10, 2016
[6] Vatan Emrooz, March 5, 2016
[7] ILNA News Agenvy – April 8, 2016
[8] Sharq Newspaper – April 17, 2016
[9] Sharq Newspaper – April 17, 2016
[10] Farhang state-run radio – April 18, 2016
[11] Ressalat Newspaper, February 17, 2016
[12] Iranian regime TV – April 24, 2015
[13] Mardomsalary – April 24, 2016
[14] Vatan Emrooz – April 23, 2016
[15] News Agency – April 21, 2015
[16] News Agency – August 23, 2015
[17] Emtiaz Newspaper – May 24, 2015
[18] ILNA News Agency – February 6, 2016
[19] IRNA News Agency – August 19, 2015
[20] Industry World Newspaper – November 29, 2015
[21] Rssalat Newspaper – August 23, 2015

Maryam Rajavi: Workers’ struggle is a major part of the Iranian people’s resistance to topple the ruling religious dictatorship
Sunday, 01 May 2016/National Council of Resistance of Iran/The Iranian Resistance’s President-elect Maryam Rajavi congratulated all workers of Iran on the International Labor Day. She expressed her wish that this year would a year of restitution of the rights of millions of honorable workers, men and women, who have been laid off and dismissed or have been doomed to live in fear, poverty and insecurity because their wages are not paid under white or temporary contracts.
Mrs. Rajavi lauded imprisoned workers and said: The nationwide resistance and protests of workers indicate the fact that they rightly see the ruling religious dictatorship as the prime source of oppression and violation of workers’ rights. Therefore, the deprived workers of Iran will not achieve their rights unless the clerical regime is overthrown.
The Iranian Resistance’s President-elect elaborated on the regime’s policies against the interests of Iranian workers and pointed out: Workers lost their jobs and livelihood in the course of the unremitting trend of factories going bankrupt and the shutdown of 60% of industrial centers. The sale and fraudulent auctions of factories, the economic corruption and expansion of black markets, also the bankruptcy of banks and stepped-up import of foreign goods target Iran’s workers as their prime victims. In the meantime, the treacherous policy of allocating a lion’s share of the country’s revenues to the war and massacre in the region, especially in Syria, has made Iranian workers ever poorer and destitute.
She added: For years, the minimum wage of Iranian workers has remained at one dollar per hour. According to the regime’s officials, 60% of workers do not even receive their minimum wages. Their purchasing power has plunged 187% since 2009. Lay-offs and dismissals have intensified under Rouhani’s government, and those workers who have not yet lost their jobs have not received their wages for months and do not enjoy any job security under white and temporary job contracts. The greater majority of Iran’s work force work under such contracts which were designed to subjugate workers and compel them to accept cheap pay.
Addressing Iranian workers all across the country, Mrs. Rajavi reiterated: The clerical regime and its various factions have built their subsistence on the plunder of your energy and livelihood. Nevertheless, their crisis-riddled regime is vulnerable to your solidarity and unity of action, despite its crackdowns.
Your struggle to gain your rights is a major part of the nation’s struggle to overthrow the mullahs’ religious tyranny, Mrs. Rajavi noted.
Secretariat of the National Council of Resistance of Iran/April 30, 2016

Maryam Rajavi’s message on International Labor Day
Sunday, 01 May 2016/National Council of Resistance of Iran/NCRI – The following is the text of the message of Maryam Rajavi, President-elect of the Iranian Resistance, to mark International Workers Day:
Fellow toiling workers,
Fellow compatriots who have been dismissed or are unemployed,
Millions of honorable men and women who have been forced to live in fear, destitution and insecurity because of dismissals, white and temporary contracts and unpaid wages,
I congratulate you all on the International Labor Day!
Although the ruling despots have made life gloomy and bitter for you, but contrary to the mullahs, we celebrate the International Labor Day as the universal symbol of workers’ struggle, a day that heralds emancipation of mankind from oppression and exploitation. Because there is a potent force in your suffering and your will power to end such pain and bring about liberty and emancipation.
Let us remember on this day the combatant worker and brave political prisoner, Shahrokh Zamani, who was jailed for his efforts to establish labor syndicates and lost his life last year due to inhuman pressure and treatment of Khamenei’s henchmen in prison.
Let us hail the imprisoned workers who are resisting in the regime’s dungeons and the courageous laborers who risk their own dismissal to protest violations of the most basic rights and freedoms of workers.
Workers set a record last year, by staging numerous protests, strikes, marches, and gatherings, and by signing protest petitions in various production units in every province.
They also travelled frequently from various cities to the capital to stage protest rallies in front of the mullahs’ parliament, the presidential office, the ministries, the Mostaz’afan Foundation, and other government offices. By doing so, they stressed the fact that Iran’s toiling workers see the country’s ruling religious dictatorship as the source of misfortune for the majority of the Iranian populace. Indeed, they are the prime advocates of exploitation, oppression and aggression on the rights of workers.
Workers lost their jobs and livelihood in the course of the unremitting trend of factories going bankrupt which led to the shutdown of 60% of industrial centers. They were not even able to receive their unpaid dues.
The sale and fraudulent auctions of factories, the economic corruption and expansion of black markets, also the bankruptcy of banks and stepped-up import of foreign goods, target Iran’s workers as their prime victims.
Also, the treacherous policy of allocating a lion’s share of the country’s revenues to the war and massacre in Syria, has made Iranian workers ever poorer and destitute.
For years, the minimum wage of workers has remained at one dollar per hour. Their purchasing power, however, has plunged 187% since 2009. According to the regime’s officials, 60% of workers are not in any position to receive even their minimum wages while the one-dollar-an-hour wage of Iranian laborers is not even one-fourth of workers’ wage in the world’s most crisis-riddled economies, such as Greece.
The Tsunami of lay-offs and dismissals has intensified under Rowhani’s government, and group after group of workers join the millions-strong army of unemployed every day. Official estimates put the number of unemployed workers at over one million. Over the past two years, 166,000 industrialist workers have lost their jobs. Those who have not lost their jobs are under pressure of having not received their wages while they do not have any job security since they were forced to sign white and temporary contracts to have a job.
According to the Iranian regime’s Labor Ministry, 93% of the country’s working force is working under such contracts. This is one of the regime’s most cruel plans designed to subjugate workers and compel them into cheap labor.
Iranian workers are among the world’s least-paid and most vulnerable work force who face constant threat of dismissal and the lowest job security.
Despite the horrific economic stagnation in Iran, it is the ruling mullahs’ overlooking of the fate of workers that contributes most significantly to their victimization as a result of criminal policies.
The various regime factions also share interest in the plunder of the product of workers’ lives and energy and crackdown on their legitimate protests. This is why workers’ conditions deteriorate every year as attested by official figures and reports.
Another stain on the record of the clerical regime is the workers’ living conditions in their residential quarters and camps around the country such as in the South Pars region, Asalouyeh, and Nakhl Taghi.
In their advertisements, the mullahs call Asalouyeh the nation’s “Great Oil Civilization” or “Energy Capital.” However, they have piled up tens of thousands of workers in small, crowded, filthy rooms filled with bugs. Workers receive little and low-quality food and get poisoned frequently. Their transportation is quite old and every year, a considerable number of workers get killed in road accidents. Drinking water is virtually non-existent, health clinics are not adequate, while narcotic drugs are easily at hand. So, workers have been doomed to live in near-slavery conditions in this industrial town.
The mullahs have set up the pillars of their rule on such poverty and destitution. They neither want nor are able to change this situation any bit. This is why it is impossible to gain the minimum rights of Iranian workers and toilers without a regime change.
Freedom of independent organizations, the right to stage strikes and protest gatherings, abolition of temporary and white contracts, disbanding of major contractors of labor force, prompt payment of wages and all past-due demands, provision of health and unemployment insurance and other demands of workers threaten the regime’s existence because they bring about freedom for workers to various degrees. So, achieving every single one of such demands is intertwined with the struggle for regime change.
Valiant workers,
The mullahs’ crisis-riddled regime is vulnerable to your unity of action and joint struggle. Your persistence on demanding your inalienable rights is part of the struggle of the whole nation to overthrow the ruling religious tyranny.
A glance over the history of the resistance against the clerical regime, reveals that workers have always had a brilliant presence in the ranks of the movement, in the publication of newsletters for workers and the struggles of the early years after the revolution and throughout the years of resistance in the National Liberation Army.
The day is not far when the courageous workers of Iran and the brave youths of our country form the Liberation Army’s units hand in hand with all the regime’s opponents and rise up to gain their freedoms and the nation’s great right to national sovereignty.
The day is not far when all the oppressed people of Iran will achieve their fundamental rights, freedom, social justice, equality and the welfare they deserve in a free Iran.
Happy International Labor Day to you all. 30 April 2016

Political prisoner urges Iran’s workers to protest against regime
Sunday, 01 May 2016//National Council of Resistance of Iran/NCRI – Abolqasem Fouladvand, an Iranian political prisoner in Gohardasht (Rajai Shahr) Prison in Karaj, north-west of Tehran, issued a statement on the occasion of International Workers’ Day and Teachers’ Day in Iran. He urged the people of Iran, in particular workers and teachers, to protest against the mullahs’ regime.
Mr. Fouladvand was arrested on June 11, 2013 and was sentenced to 18 imprisonment on February 8, 2014 for having links to the main Iranian opposition group People’s Mojahedin of Organization of Iran (PMOI or MEK) and for insulting the regime’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.
The following is the text of his statement smuggled out of prison:
We are on the eve of International Workers’ Day and Teachers’ Day while numerous workers and teachers of our country are imprisoned or hanged under the bogus charge of acting against national security (that’s to say mullahs’ security) because of their demand for union rights. The fascist and fundamentalist clerics after drinking the chalice of nuclear poison are now on the eve of drinking a chalice of regional poison in the second Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). They do not have the courage to admit that they are faced with popular uprisings. They do not want or wish to solve the problems of workers, teachers, nurses, pensioners and other classes of people in the country.
The most fundemental goal of this regime is to loot and plunder the interests of the country and to create terror and oppression, and torture and execution in the domestic arena. It is our duty to cry out our slogans of ‘Work, Bread, Freedom’ with the battle to overthrow and eradicate the anti-human mullahs’ regime.
It is incumbent upon me to declare my support and sympathy for the protests and rightful demands mentioned in the statement of Jafar Azimzadeh and Esmail Abdi who represent a large number of workers and teachers. We also remember the recent martyred teachers, workers and laborers including Abbas Amani, Farzad Kamangar, Mohammad Ali Haji Aqai, Sattar Beheshti, Gholamreza Khosravi and Shahrokh Zamani. We believe that the only solution to all problems and sufferings of workers, teachers, nurses and other people in our homeland is to overthrow this inhumane and reactionary regime.
I ask all workers and toilers to stand in solidarity with the teachers, nurses and students to fight for our great right to freedom, and together with 1000 Ashrafs and the liberation army to overthrow this cruel and oppressive mullahs’ regime.
Death to the principle of Velayat-e Faqih (religious rule)
Long live Rajavi
Abolqasem Fouladvand
Gohardasht (Rajai Shahr) Prison, Karaj/April 29, 2016