Telecommunications Pensioners Protest in Several Provinces; Oil Workers Strike on Sirri Island

On Monday, protests over living conditions in Iran continued with gatherings of telecommunications pensioners in at least eight cities, protests by oil industry workers on Sirri Island, and demonstrations by citizens from mining-affected areas in Isfahan in front of the Ministry of Industry, Mine, and Trade in Tehran. According to reports received by Voice of America and published by trade sources on Monday, October 15, a number of telecommunications pensioners gathered in various cities across Iran, including Shiraz, Ahvaz, Kermanshah, Sanandaj, Ardabil, Isfahan, Ilam, and Borujerd. Pensioners in Tehran chanted: "If one embezzlement is reduced, our problem will be solved" and "The company is a mess, it's all about eating and drinking." Pensioners in Ilam also protested with the slogan "Implementing the regulations is our legitimate right." In Kermanshah, telecommunications pensioners emphasized their living problems and rising inflation, chanting: "Retirement pay lasts only a week." In Ahvaz, protesting pensioners marched, chanting: "We want nothing but our rights, we do not want shareholders' charity." Pensioners in Sanandaj also emphasized the necessity of lawfulness among telecommunications officials and the implementation of regulations. The executive regulation of Article 24 of the Civil Service Law, approved in 2010, concerns the assignable duties and how to purchase services from the private sector, stating that "until the obstacles to assignment are removed," the provision of services to the workforce remains the responsibility of the executive body, namely the government. However, 14 years after the approval of this regulation, and given the repeated and ongoing protests of these pensioners, it seems that neither the "obstacles to assignment" have been removed nor has the executive body fulfilled its duties towards the protesters. Weekly protests by telecommunications pensioners have been ongoing for months. The lack of updates to welfare allowances in 2022 and 2023, management's disregard for the 2010 regulations, problems with supplementary insurance, and the non-payment of past claims at current rates are among the reasons for these pensioners' protests. Concurrently with the living condition protests of telecommunications pensioners, a group of oil and gas industry workers on Sirri Island in Hormozgan Province protested, demanding reforms to the salary system for operational oil workers. Their demands included reforming the salary and wage system, refunding excess taxes deducted, and adjusting their minimum wage. In another event, a group of protesting citizens from the Torqroud area, Natanz, and mining-affected areas in Isfahan gathered on Monday in front of the Ministry of Industry, Mine, and Trade in Tehran. According to the Iranian Pensioners' Council, these citizens protested against the "unimaginable destruction by miners" and stated, "We received no response from indifferent officials during our nine-day gathering in Torqroud." These protesting citizens also emphasized: "We are witnesses to the dismemberment of our existence from the mountains of the region" and have come to the Ministry of Industry to "make a final statement." The expansion of protests among various groups, including pensioners, workers from different industries, teachers, defrauded investors, and nurses and healthcare workers, indicates an increase in living problems in Iran and the indifference of the Islamic Republic's officials. The continuation of living condition protests in Iran comes amid the potential for retaliatory responses from Israel to the Islamic Republic's missile attacks, with ongoing unrest in Iran's financial markets. According to the website Banasbast, which tracks the changes in foreign currency and gold and coin prices in the Iranian market, at the time of this report, one US dollar was being sold for 63,200 tomans in the free market, and the price of one gold coin was 50 million tomans. In this context, economist Siamak Javadi told Voice of America that financial and monetary markets flee from any instability like cheese from a knife. He stated that due to the shock from the war, capitalists are withdrawing from their rial assets, causing the dollar price to rise at least temporarily, and currently, the Islamic Republic has managed to keep the dollar price unrealistically low through "huge currency injections."