Iran’s popular, despotic dictatorship

Press, 26 May 1979, Page 14

Iran’s popular, despotic dictatorship

By

DAVID SHEARS,

of the “Guax'dian’’

Mohammed calls himself the "honest guide” of Shiraz, the city of roses, wine and poets. Delighted to find a tourist in these hard times — and a journalist into the bargain — he regaled me with his unorthodox political views.

"I want the King back,” he proclaimed between mosques. “Only the King (the deposed Shah) knows how to run the country. That old uneducated peasant hasn’t a clue. Put it in your paper — I’m not scared to say it. Everybody in Shiraz knows my views and 80 per cent of Iranians agree with me.”

Mohammed the Heretic would be a better name for this irrepressible little guide. By the “old uneducated peasant” he meant no less a personality than Ayatollah Khomeiny, the revered revolutionary leader. All right, Mohammed, I have “put it in the paper,” But you are wrong, as wrong about those 80 per cent of Iranians as about your being an honest guide — you diddled me a few rials on the change.

The fact is that for the time being at least Iran is a popular dictatorship no less despotic than in the days of the Shah. Although disillusionment is mounting, Ayatollah- Khomeiny still enjoys a nationwide following which has to be ■seen to be believed.

He enjoyed another demonstration of his power the other day when he brought hundreds of thousands of loyalists on to the streets to mourn the assassinated Ayatollah Motahari — a man almost totally unknown to the masses. What is more, they turned the occasion into an orgy of denunciation of “communists” — a favourite term of abuse in this country which has distrusted its Russian neighbour for centuries.

Indeed, Teheran’s relations with Moscow are distinctly cool. Ayatollah Khomeiny has told the Russians not to meddle in Iran’s internal affairs. The Soviet take-over in neighbouring Afghanistan, which has hurt IranianRussian relations, will not be allowed to happen here. Not that the raggle-taggle remnants of the once-proud Iranian Army and Air Force are in any shape to brake, let alone block, an outright Russian invasion. But nobody seriously supposes that the Kremlin would risk such an adventure, at least as long as President Brezhnev remains in charge, for America could hardly ignore a threat to the oilfields of the Persian Gulf. Speaking of oil, there is no reason to suppose that either Ayatollah Khomeiny or Mr Bazargan, the Prime Minister, intends to turn off the tap. To be sure, they have imposed a four million barrels a day ceiling on crude oil production, a one-

third reduction from the level of output under the Shah’s rule, but Iran is not being notably greedier on oil prices than it was under the Shah. Exports to Britain and other worldwide customers (with boycotted exceptions such as Israel and South Africa) are moving steadily again under long-term agreements, and the income is vital to Iran’s economy. Stagnation is still the watch-word for most sectors of industry and especially in the once-booming field of construction. The authorities themselves are largely to blame. Red tape and indecision are holding up projects that are more than 90 per cent complete and could provide thousands of much-needed jobs.

For instance, one new cement plant needs only 60 switches to go into production. A BritishFrench - German - Italian, consortium is unable to finish a harbour construction project at the Persian Gulf port of Bandar Shahpur which is 95 per cent complete and could employ 3000 men. The giant Isfahan refinery being built by an American-German group is 98 per cent complete butstalled by lack of maintenance. While Iran’s central bank

is operating with some efficiency, letters of credit are freely available only in priority fields such as drugs and foodstuffs. Workers’ committees have seized control of many factories. Rather than face these frustrations, Iranian and foreign businessmen who left the country in droves during the revolution are refusing to return and revive their dormant firms. Unemployment is estimated at upwards of Three million . — one-third of the total workforce. In a Western society, these massed ranks of unemployed, now suffering increasing privation for lack of a dole, would provide a fertile source of rebellion. Already, groups of jobless Iranian workers have protested outside the Labour Ministry and the offices of local Ayatollahs. Despite the disillusionment of ordinary folk who had expected the revolution to work miracles, and the discontent of middle classes deprived of drinking, dancing and other diversions by this puritan regime, Ayatollah Khomeiny still has the masses on his side for the foreseeable future, say to the end of the year. It is hard to envisage any Leftist or other putsch which would oust him from power.

The Army is far too weak and disorganised. True, it is beginning to recover under its determined Defence Minister, Tachi Riahi, but the idea that some colonel with 1000 crack troops could seize power seems farfetched.

The spearpoint of any Leftist rebellion would be the Fedayeen guerrilla group, a tough Marxist bunch who keep the>r sandbagged headquarters constantly under guard, as

well they might, for they are prime targets of tne Islamic Anti-Communist Crusade, now assuming almost pogrom proportions. Yet the Fedayeen for all their Marxism owe no allegiance to Moscow and are quite separate from the official Russian-backed Tudeh party.

While the Tudeh is antiGod (one reason for its lack of popular support) and the Fedayeen are secular, there is another Marxist group which is dedicated to Islam: the Mujahidin. These, too, would like to see a people’s State, but with a strong Islamic flavour; possibly akin to Libya. Joining these radical forces in Iran’s first postrevolution May Day parade were the moderate opponents of the regime: the women’s, teachers’, oilworkers’ organisations —

trade unions would be too strong a word — and the social democratic National Democratic Front led by Mr M a t i n e-Daftary, a Cambridge-educated lawyer. But it is Iran’s tragedy that these disparate forces cannot work together to produce a coherent democratic opposition that might have some liberalising effect upon Khomeiny. Not that Khomeiny doesn’t have plenty of problems of his own. Aside from the economic stagnation already described, he has to cope with dissident Ayatollahs like Taleghani and ShariatMadari who have their own ideas on how to run the country, and their own devoted followings. Then Ayatollah Khomeiny has to try to curb the excessive zeal of his revolutionary committees and their armed militiamen up and down the land.

He has to contend with Mr Bazargan, the Prime Minister, who is continually complaining of interference from the Mullahs and the Revolutionary Council, the secret Islamic ruling body. But then again Mr Bazargan, a liberal social democrat, is a weak figure, essentially a puppet of Ayatollah Khomeiny and his radical Islamic Ministers, such as Dr Ibrahim Yazdi, now at the Foreign Ministry.

No, the biggest threat to Iran’s revolutionary regime is three-fold. First, there are the local autonomy movements which have led to bloody fighting in the Kurdish and Turkoman border areas. True, ceasefire pacts have brought a truce but tension continues.

Secondly, Ayatollah Khomeiny has been much shaken by the two political assassinations of recent weeks, in which a general and Ayatollah Motahari were slain by a mysterious Islamic group called Forghan. If such murders continue as threatened, the effect would be "destabilising'’ Finally, when the aged Khomeiny departs, the country might relapse into civil war. He has no obvious successor and the power struggle would then break out in earnest.

Meanwhile, as one eminent Iranian intellectual put it: “The difference between the tyranny of the Shah and the revolutionary despotism of today is that in the old days you knew how far you could go. “Today’s dictatorship is more arbitrary. When the revolutionary guards come round with a warrant for your arrest, you never know what you’ve done wrong or how long they’ll keep you locked up.”