Deputy Speaker of Parliament: I Do Not Deny Violations in the Municipality

Massoud Pezeshkian, the first deputy speaker of Parliament, criticized the municipality's violent response to critical media, stating: "I do not deny the occurrence of violations in the municipality at all." In an interview with ILNA on Wednesday, Pezeshkian emphasized the necessity for Parliament to intervene regarding the municipality's treatment of critical media. In recent weeks, following the publication of an initial report by the Inspection Organization regarding violations in the municipality concerning the allocation of Tehran's properties to specific individuals at significant discounts, the media outlets that reported these violations faced restrictions. The report, which has since been described as an unconfirmed initial report by one of the experts from the General Inspection Organization, mentioned several high-ranking officials of the Tehran municipality and members of the Tehran City Council as individuals who had managed to acquire municipal properties at high discounts. The website 'Memari News,' which was the first to publish news related to this report, was filtered, and Yashar Soltani, the editor-in-chief of this website, was arrested and sent to prison following a complaint by Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf, the mayor of Tehran, and Mehdi Chamran, the chairman of the City Council. Officials from ILNA news agency were also summoned to the cultural and media prosecutor's office during this time and were interrogated. Massoud Pezeshkian, the representative of Tabriz, criticized the Tehran municipality's treatment of critical media, saying: "Rest assured that society is the best observer and judge, and if someone treats the media unfairly and unjustly, they will harm themselves more." According to Pezeshkian, "Unfair treatment of the media and public opinion causes the most damage to the system." Following these developments, several members of the Tehran City Council, referred to as reformist council members, called for an investigation into the municipality regarding the allocation of astronomical properties to specific individuals, but that investigation did not receive a vote in the City Council. Subsequently, several members of the Islamic Consultative Assembly submitted a request for an investigation into the Tehran municipality to the Urban Development Commission in the first week of Mehr (September-October). This request was submitted with 21 signatures to this commission, and according to Sadegh Badri, the spokesman for the Urban Development Commission, "Sessions for the investigation into the Tehran municipality will be held with the presence of the designers of the investigation and Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf." According to this parliament member, based on the law, "the Tehran municipality has 15 days from the receipt of this request to send its documents, records, and evidence for review to the commission." The representative from Ardabil in the Islamic Consultative Assembly continued: "If the designers insist on their request after discussing and exchanging views on the reasons for the investigation and do not withdraw, the investigation into the municipality will be addressed on the fifth of Aban (October-November), with the presence of the applicants for the investigation and the mayor of Tehran, and the fate of the investigation into the Tehran municipality will be determined." Meanwhile, Fatemeh Saidi, a representative from Tehran in the Islamic Consultative Assembly, emphasized in an interview with ILNA: "We are pursuing the investigation into the Tehran municipality and hope to provide the necessary transparency in this regard." Massoud Pezeshkian, in the continuation of his conversation with ILNA, stated: "The possibility of violations exists in any system." According to the first deputy speaker of Parliament, "If we prevent discussion about several violations of a system, people will think that the violations are many times more, and this way, by violent responses, they have prevented discussions about the violations." The representative from Tabriz in Parliament emphasized that "representatives are obliged to address such treatment of the media."