As Iran Politicians Grapple With Crises, People Want Change
In what appears to be a coincidence, politicians representing opposite ends of the Islamic Republic's political spectrum have recently brought up the issue of shadow governments.
In what appears to be a coincidence, politicians representing opposite ends of the Islamic Republic's political spectrum have recently brought up the issue of shadow governments.
Iran stands out as one of the few countries, if not the only one, where shadow governments are established by allies of the ruling government rather than by its political adversaries.
The formation of a shadow government, initiated by populist ultraconservative politician Saeed Jalili in 2013, seemed logical during the tenure of the relatively moderate government led by Hassan Rouhani. However, Jalili persisted with these shadow government meetings even after like-minded ultraconservative Ebrahim Raisi assumed power in 2021.
Amir Hossein Sabeti, a state television presenter, who won a seat in the Iranian parliament (Majles) recently, wrote in a series of tweets that he attended a meeting of the "economic diplomacy work group" at the shadow government's office in Tehran.
Sabeti was Jalili’s chief of staff before leaving for the state television to become a talk show host, where Jalili's brother Vahid is the deputy director. The hardliner Paydari group, with the Jalili brothers as its influential members, control the state TV, where they propagate their ideology.
Sabeti wrote that senior officials from the Ministries of Economy and Agriculture as well as the governor of Central Bank, Tehran Governor General's office and even the Imam's Executive Headquarters, one of the richest entities operating under the aegis of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei were present at the meeting.
The meeting, Sabeti said, discussed the problem of bringing in hard foreign currency cash into Iran from abroad. He added that the meeting called on the government to hold similar meetings to solve Iran’s shortage of US dollars. Meanwhile, he criticized the parliament for not cooperating with the government.
From Sabeti's tweet it was clear that Jalili is running a parallel government that tries to make up for the inefficiency of the Raisi Administration.
Incidentally, on the same date, conservative website Tabnak, which is close to Mohsen Rezaei, the man who coordinates meetings between the heads of the executive, legislative and judiciary bodies, quoted Reformist politician Mehdi Ayati as suggesting that Iran's Reformists who have been sidelined and ignored in the latest three elections in the country, should form their own shadow government.
Ayati added that if the Reformists fail in that endeavor, they will be forgotten soon, suggesting that the reformists should become active critics of the government. He also argued that political figures such as former President Mohammad Khatami and his aide Behzad Nabavi should retire and allow younger Reformists to restore their lost social credibility.
Parviz Amini, a prominent conservative sociologist during a recent televised debate said that the Reformist and Conservative definition of politics in Iran has lost its meaning. “Even the idea of boycotting the elections by Reformists never materialized because they are no longer active players." He added that the government turned the elections from a national event into smaller local events where family and tribal bonds were the driving force rather than political forces and ideology."
Amini argued that "there are no political forces in Iran with defined doctrines. Instead, the entire Iranian society is focused on the demand for change. Since the 2010s absolute poverty has tripled in Iran, public welfare has declined by more than 35 percent, and the national currency has been devalued by tens of times and all those problems brough about three major rounds of protests since 2018. In such a situation, elections and political parties are no longer the people's focus. They are only focused on change."
In an interview with the semi-official Mehr News Agency on Tuesday, Mohammad Moghimi asserted that not a single academic has been dismissed from Iran’s top state university on political grounds.
“The ethical problems of some professors who make a lot of noise on social media, by the way, has been proven,” Moghimi claimed.
In September 2023, Moghimi asserted that he had “full knowledge” that some academics who had been dismissed had faced lawsuits from students regarding "ethical matters."
The latest wave of academic purges in Iran began during President Ebrahim Raisi's administration. It gained momentum shortly after nationwide protests under the banner of "Woman, Life, Freedom" erupted following the death of Mahsa (Jina) Amini in the custody of the so-called morality police on September 16, 2022. Following Amini’s death, many universities became centers of extensive months-long student protests.
While the law prohibits the military from entering academic institutions, plainclothes security forces and organized militia were extensively deployed to suppress the student protests. Armed plainclothes agents and vigilantes went so far as to attack students inside Tehran’s Sharif University of Technology on October 3, 2022, resulting in the arrest of dozens of students.
Academics Fired Over Protest Support
Ali Sharifi-Zarchi, a prominent member of the bioinformatics and AI Faculty within the prestigious computer engineering department of Sharif University of Technology, was among the first to be dismissed for his support of dissident students.
Zarchi's revelation of the actions taken against him prompted several other academics, such as Somayyeh Sima, a faculty member in the water engineering department at Tarbiat Modares University, to come forward and share their own experiences.
Numerous academics who were dismissed, terminated, suspended, or demoted for supporting protesting students faced arbitrary accusations. They were accused of “academic sluggishness”, “political immorality and media show-off”, and "defiling" the academic arena with their "factional and even anti-national views" by the ministry of higher education.
The purge has been widely attributed to ultra-hardliners allied with President Ebrahim Raisi, aiming to assert dominance in the political arena by ousting other politicians, officials, and academics. Former moderate conservative Speaker Ali Larijani coined the term "purification" to characterize these plans.
Academic Purges: From 1980 To Today
The history of academic purges in the Islamic Republic dates back to 1980, shortly after the victory of the Islamic Revolution. The newly established government's Cultural Revolutionary Headquarters shut down universities across Iran for three years, aiming to eliminate dissenting voices and impose its Islamic revolutionary ideology on higher education institutions.
During that period, thousands of professors and students were purged for a variety of reasons, including their political affiliations and perceived Western influences, in what became known as the "Cultural Revolution".
Throughout Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's presidency (2005-2013), closely aligned with hardliners, the regime sought to recruit academics who shared the ideological stance of the hardline and religious establishment. Concurrently, it endeavored to eradicate its political adversaries, namely reformists, from academia.
Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has also repeatedly emphasized that universities must adhere to Islamic principles, asserting that those not aligned with the regime should be barred from teaching. In a speech delivered in July 2015, he stated, "Do not employ unreliable individuals in universities at any cost." He urged, "There are good professors; employ them."