A large protest and march by oil and gas workers in Gachsaran, telecommunications workers in Shiraz, and municipal employees in Tehran

Protests by retirees in Tehran, Shiraz, Zanjan, Urmia, Sanandaj, Ilam, Bijar, Bandar Abbas, Kermanshah, Ahvaz, Shush, Rasht, Isfahan, Hamedan, Tabriz, and Damghan.
Today is a day of mourning; the workers’ community is in ruin today; We will not rest until we reclaim our rights; Under the weight of inflation, the people’s backs are broken; Scream, scream, against this much oppression; Both the parliament and the government are against the people; We will fight, we will fight; we will not accept humiliation.
The exploitative and warmongering policies of Khamenei and the malign domination of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) over the country’s economy have plunged the overwhelming majority of the population, especially workers and the underprivileged, into extreme poverty, making them poorer by the day. Even regime-affiliated sources admit that “more than 80% of Iranian households have fallen below the global poverty line” (Eghtesad 24 website, December 20, 2024).
Today, Monday, December 23, 2024, telecommunications retirees in cities such as Tehran, Isfahan, Shiraz, Zanjan, Rasht, Urmia, Sanandaj, Kermanshah, Ahvaz, Ilam, Bijar, Bandar Abbas, Hamedan, and Tabriz staged protests against low wages and the plundering of their earnings. Employees of the Falatgareh Oil Company in the Lavan region also held a protest gathering.
On Sunday, December 22, 2024, workers from the Gachsaran Oil and Gas Company, social security retirees in Kermanshah, Ahvaz, Shush, and Rasht, steel retirees in Tehran, Isfahan, Damghan, and Semnan, telecommunications employees in Shiraz, and municipal enforcement personnel in Tehran organized protest gatherings.
Workers from the Gachsaran Oil and Gas Operating Company protested poor living and working conditions and the exploitation of their wages, chanting slogans such as, “We will not rest until we reclaim our rights” and “Today is a day of mourning; the workers’ community is in ruin today.”
In Tehran, municipal enforcement personnel protested against a tax increase, which now reaches 4 million tomans per month, outside the City Council.
Steel and mining retirees in Tehran gathered in front of the “Ministry of Cooperatives, Labor, and Social Welfare,” while retirees from the same sector in Damghan and Isfahan protested against their low pensions.
Social security retirees in Ahvaz protested their dire living conditions outside the provincial Social Security Administration, chanting, “Inflation and high prices are the people’s misery” and “Their slogan is ‘Hussein, Hussein,’ but their work is lies and theft.” Retirees in Shush gathered, chanting, “Under the weight of inflation, the people’s backs are broken.”
On Saturday, retirees in Kermanshah protested, chanting, “Scream, scream, against this much oppression,” “Both the parliament and the government are against the people,” “We will fight, we will fight; we will not accept humiliation,” “The puppet government, the erosive budget,” and “Workers and retirees, unity, unity.”
Jalayi Pour, a sociologist, and Mohammad Sarafraz, the former head of the regime’s state broadcaster (IRIB), stated on December 13, 2024: “Polls during Mr. Raisi’s tenure show that 90% of Iranians are dissatisfied with the current situation. Some are worried that people might once again rise in rebellion, leading to widespread protests” (Jalayi Pour’s YouTube interview, December 13).
Mrs. Maryam Rajavi, the President-elect of the NCRI, saluted the retirees, workers, and laborers who have risen against poverty, corruption, inflation, and discrimination. She stated, “Our homeland is one of the richest countries in the world, but under the rule of religious fascism, the people become poorer every day. The only solution is the overthrow of the clerical regime and the establishment of democracy and the sovereignty of the people.”

Secretariat of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI)
23 December 2024