Tehran Deputy Mayor: Municipal Debt is Approximately 52 Trillion Tomans

While the Deputy Mayor of Tehran has stated that the total municipal debt is around 52 trillion tomans, a member of the city council attributed this large debt to a "costly management style" and "friendly project allocations" during the previous mayor's term. Less than two months ago, Mohammad Ali Najafi, the Mayor of Tehran, mentioned the registered municipal debt as "approximately 30 trillion tomans." However, the newspaper Shargh, in its Sunday, March 4 issue, quoted Hojjat Mirzaei, the Deputy for Planning, Urban Development, and Council Affairs of the Tehran Municipality, stating: "The exact figure of Tehran's municipal debt is around 52 trillion tomans." Mr. Mirzaei also mentioned that the municipality's debt to contractors is 9 trillion tomans and noted that "a large portion of these debts lack documented evidence and information." On the other hand, Mahmoud Mirloohi, a member of the Tehran City Council, in an interview with the same newspaper, stated that the confirmed municipal debts are "at least 53 trillion tomans" and added that "the annual interest on Tehran's municipal debt to banks is about 6 trillion tomans." Over the six months since Mohammad Ali Najafi was elected as the Mayor of Tehran, he and several members of the fifth city council have repeatedly criticized the "financial corruption" during Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf's mayoralty, either explicitly or implicitly. In his 100-day report to the city council, Najafi referred to "violations of the previous municipality," including "astronomical contracts" and "contracts with the police that funded elections." Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf, who held the mayoralty of Tehran for 12 years and was a presidential candidate twice during that time, has rejected these criticisms. In the final days of his management, he stated on state television that the total debts of the capital's municipality were around 15 trillion tomans while simultaneously claiming that he was owed 19 trillion tomans from the government. The references to a "costly management style" and "friendly allocations" imply or directly point to the existence of "widespread financial corruption" in the Tehran municipality since the tenure of Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf and the arrest of his former deputy, Eisa Sharifi. The current mayor of Tehran, Mohammad Ali Najafi, who had previously pointed out some violations in the previous term in a written report, tweeted on Saturday regarding the municipality's debts: "Can the money of the people of Tehran be spent on showy matters? I wish that in the past, unnecessary expenses and wastefulness were not so recklessly taken from the pockets of the people of Tehran." Additionally, Hassan Rasouli, a member of the Tehran City Council, told Shargh that the cost of managing the city in previous years was very high due to "that management style," and according to him, "the cause of this issue also relates to the lack of competition and the friendly nature of project allocations." According to this city official, more than 50% of Tehran's municipal contracts were awarded to contractors without tenders and auctions and bypassed formalities. Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf and members of the previous city council have not yet responded to these statements. However, previously, Hossein Ghorban-zadeh, an advisor to Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf, accused the new mayor of the capital of "absolute blackening of the situation."