A WARNING FROM TEACHERS TO THE AHMADINEJAD
GOVERNMENT:
“OUR STUDENTS ARE OUR WEAPONS!”
There are around 15 million workers in Iran.
Considering that half of them are married and have one
child, we come to the conclusion that the number of people
working with a worker’s wage is more than 30 million. This
also overlaps with the poverty line in Iran.
For the last few years, we have frequently
witnessed the protest demonstrations or strikes of
discharged and unpaid workers. The government simply ignores
the incidents rather than finding a solution to the workers
problems . Moreover, it carries out a campaign of
intimidation by driving its police forces and intelligence
officers against workers that “demand their rights”. Nobody
ever believes in “the fairy tales of the regime” asserting
that no such crisis like unemployment, poverty and
expensiveness exists in the country.
Since early March, we have witnessed the
gathering of teachers in front of Majlis. Even the employees
working as teachers, which is a sacred profession, demand a
solution for the implementation of The Appropriate Revenue
Law (Nezame Hamahengi Hoghugh) that will rearrange the
salaries and the problems of their contracted colleagues
that are not granted permanent status. During demonstrations
held in important settlements in the country, Tehran in
particular, teachers chanted following slogans: Shame on you
Justice Council !, People have never seen such a shameless
Majles before! , Teachers do not sleep and hate all
discriminations. The spokesman of the demonstrators demanded
President Ahmadinejad to do something regarding the problems
of teachers in a week. As can be seen, it is not bearable
anymore. Most teachers in the country have to work in second
and even third jobs because their salaries are insufficient.
Naturally, several people have been captured
and taken away during the demonstrations. Along with our
brothers Ali Akbar Bagali, Mahmud Bahashdi, Ali Reza
Hashemi, Muhammad Gaveri and Ali Pur Suleyman who were
arrested in Tehran on March 7, 3 teachers in Yazd and 2 in
Ardabil were taken under custody and released the following
day due to the public support given to teachers.
It is useful to mention that the meeting
held on March 13 upon these developments within the Iran
Islamic Guidance Council to evaluate the demands of teachers
and to seek a ground for compromise has been a fiasco.
Unfortunately, no result has come out of this meeting
participated by 13 teachers representing the demonstrators,
3 deputies representing the Haraset (Protection and
Information) Department of the Majlis, 2 officers from the
Sarullah, a Revolutionary Guards unit responsible for the
security of Tehran in emergency situations, and 3 officers
from the ministry of intelligence.
During this meeting where the
representatives of teachers expressed their demands for a
raise in their salaries, the representatives of the
government stated that their efforts have been maintained to
solve the problems of the teachers. Instead of a direct
raise, they offered teachers the complimentary allocation of
share certificates called Equity Shares (Sahmi Adalat).
According to this proposal, teachers will completely own the
shares after the profits reach to the level of the cost of
the certificates. In case they fail to solve the problem
soon, we will restart public demonstrations, emphasized the
representatives of teachers, rejecting the mentioned offer
and insisting on a raise in cash.
One should ask now: Why do not the problems
of teachers, struggling to make a living and possessing
their pens as their sole weapon, interest the members of the
Government that claim to present social welfare? Why? Why
don’t they listen to the problems of these people who work
on a self-sacrificing manner? Why do they keep offering
short lived and invalid solutions, rather than producing
lasting solutions?
Don’t you think it is time someone to say to
our leader: Antagonizing these people who perform an
occupation so sacred as teaching in a self-sacrificing
manner and shape up future generations is equal to placing
dynamites at the foundations of the regime and the whole
country?
