Iran, plagued with poverty and drought

A brief review of destruction of human beings and environment over 4 decades of the clerical regime’s rule

Introduction

Thirty-eight years after the mullahs seized power in Iran, the economic forecast for ordinary Iranians looks dire. The middle-class in Iran has been all but extinguished. Save for a few affluent neighborhoods that house the extremely wealthy, the vast majority of the country’s 80-million population live well under the poverty line. Breadwinners for many households are forced to take up secondary and tertiary jobs to make ends meet. Almost all across Iran, notices are put up on city walls by people willing to sell a kidney for the equivalent of $2,000. Those who do have a job, such as miners and factory workers, often are forced to work for months without pay.

The grim state of poverty contrasts with the immense Iranian national wealth that is being poured by the authorities into Syria to prop up dictator Bashar al-Assad and into other Middle Eastern hotspots such as Iraq and Yemen as part of the regime’s drive to impose its hegemony on the region. Another cause of public anger is the huge percentage of the country’s wealth which is pocketed by the elite super-rich – the mullahs, Revolutionary Guards and their affiliates and relatives. “The government of the elite 4 percent” – this was a major charge levelled against Hassan Rouhani’s administration in the course of the sham Presidential election.