How Khomeini defeated the workers movement
THE FOLLOWING is the first of three articles on the defeat and beginning recovery of the workers movement in Khomeini's Iran.
CARRR NIKRREN
SABER NIKBEEN
The wave of terror unleashed by the Islamic regime in June and July of 1981 led rapidly to a general defeat of the revolutionary mass movement and a complete takeover by the bourgeois-clerical faction of the post-revolutionary institutions. The main forces of the left, which claimed to defend the working class and enjoyed a considerable base inside it, were not prepared for this counterrevolutionary onslaught.
The collaborators - led by the pro-Moscow Tudeh Party and their Fedayan fellow travellers (the majority or Ekseriyat, faction) - continued to support the regime of "militant Moslems" claiming that it was at least "anti-imperialist." They denounced the opposition to the terror as the result of "imperialist plots."
Under the circumstances then prevailing, such an attitude meant active cooperation with the repressive forces of the bourgeois statethe Pasdaran Army, the Islamic anjomans, the baseej corps, the hezbollahi thugs, (1) the Imam's komitehs, etc.
The oppositionists - the largest being the Fedayan Minority Faction (the Aghaliyat) and Peykar (a Maoist group) made the fundamental mistake of tail-ending the Mojahedeen Organization. At that time, the Mojahedden were aiming for a rapid take-over of power from above, hoping to win control of the government through the armed actions of their own militia and promised support from a faction of the army and the Shite clergy itself.
The consequences of this are now history. The workers movement underwent a rapid disintegration. The larger left opposition forces went down with the Mojahedeen without having enough time to realise what was happening. The forces of counterrevolution were greatly strengthened. Having tested the relationship of
International Viewpoint 25 November 1985 forces, the reactionaries pushed for a final, decisive blow against all the remaining manifestations of the revolutionary movement. The collaborators themselves now came under the gun because they were no longer needed.
The salient result of this period was the almost total destruction of all the independent organizations of the masses, including the potentially independent workers councils (shoras). Arrests en masse and summary executions of thousands of known militants followed suit. The situation deteriorated so rapidly that before the third anniversary of the February 1979 insurrection, none of the major gains of the revolution remained intact.
In the face of this defeat, opportunists of all colours - who had in fact constantly underestimated the counterrevolutionary potential of the Islamic bourgeois regime and its petty-bourgeois shock troops and who were responsible for the unpreparedness of the revolutionary movement -claimed that their error was to overestimate the capacities of the Islamic working class.
The events of the last four years have, however, shown that the opportunists were just as mistaken about the working class as they were about the "Islamic" leaders. The working class remains, despite the ever increasing repression, the only major social force of opposition to the counterrevolution.
The workers movement has outlasted the capitalist offensive, gradually reconstructing its defences, and it is even beginning to prepare for a general confrontation. It has already forced the Islamic regime to retreat on some important issues.
The recovery of the workers movement has to be looked at in its various phases, and the changes that have come about have to be understood. This is necessary in order to
IRAN be able to see the possibilities that exist in the present situation for a future revival of the mass move. ment.
Just as the workers movement in September to February 1979 helped to radicalise the mass movement against the shah, today it can give impetus to the popular discontent with Khomeini. This time, the rise in workers struggles may have to provide the catalyst for the mass movement, and not vice versa, as was the case before.
The new role of the workers movement has been indicated already in relation to the anti-war movement and the protests of the urban poor. Following the latest waves of workers actions (strikes, go-slows, protests), there has been a definite increase in all other forms of resistance by the oppressed and toiling sections against the reactionary policies of the Khomeini regime.
It should not be forgotten that the rise that led to the Iranian revolution began in fact in the summer of 1976, with a sharp rise in activity amongst the urban poor of major cities, such as Tehran, Estahan, Tabriz, and Ahwaz. At that time, for example, Tehran had something over half a million unemployed or underemployed poor. Today, this figure has gone well over the 2 million mark, and is still growing. Any major victory for the working class could immediately create an explosive social situation.
In such conditions, it is no accident that the regime of the mullahs is staking everything on keeping the repressive forces constantly mobilized and suppressing any movement before it can spread. The terror of the summer of 1981 marked the beginning of this period.
The capitalist offensive was launched after a considerable period of decline in the workers movement caused by the Iran-Iraq war. Under the cover of this war, the Islamic anjomans were successfully utilized by the regime to oppose and disrupt the activities of the independent shoras.
In almost every major factory, there were, before the offensive was launched, powerful pro-regime anjomans, themselves armed and also linked to Pasdaran (2) units outside. . The military drills they conducted (daily in most places) were supposed to be to train volunteers for the front.
1. "Anjoman" means "society." The anjomans were built by Islamic fundamenta. lists to replace the shoras, ,, councils. "Baseej" means "mobilization, It was used for corps of volunteers organized by the regime. "Hezbollah" means the "party of God," it was used by rightists who attacked demonstrations considered to be organized by un-Godly parties. -IV
2. "Pasdar" means "guard." The pasdars were the militias organized by the clergy. The Persian plural is "pasdaran. "-IV.
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Iranian army troops march past the presidential review stand - June 1984 (DR)
In fact, they were designed to create an atmosphere of fear and apprehension inside the factories.
The capitalist regime had also suceeded in most places in forcing through a drastic cut in wages by either simply not allowing any increases and letting monetary inflation do the job, or by imposing direct cuts in incomes) and longer hours, except in the most powerful sectors of the working class. The forty hour week gave way to 44 and then to the 48-hour week. Furthermore, to help the war efforts of the regime, productivity deals were imposed in many factories. Terror-JuneDecember 1981
All of these measures were not, however, sufficient to prompt capital investments and a return of the capitalists who had fled the revolution. The summer 1981 offensive was designed to remedy this failing.
The fact that this onslaught was indeed a capitalist offensive is clearly indicated by its immediate aims of crushing the workers' resistance. In almost every workplace, militant workers were arrested en masse and extensive lay-offs were carried out.
At every factory gate, the armed guards of the Islamic anjomans and/or pasdars would do body searches to prevent any political propaganda reaching the workers. Distribution of any kind of literature not approved by the anjomans was prohibited. In many factories, political discussions could be punished with expulsions.
A tactic more or less universally used by the anjomans in the first days of the terror was to create some disturbance in the factory directed against well-known militant leaders, then bring in the pasdars to arrest 24 those "responsible" for the conflict and "restore order."
In addition, the anjomans would provide a list of militant workers and demand that the management sack them or else face the consequences. The management would then lay these workers off or even hand them over to the pasdars. In most places, the lists published by the anjomans were actually invitations to the repressive forces to arrest the named workers.
A few examples will illustrate what took place after June 21, 1981:
In the railways in Tehran, a leaflet signed by the "Hezbollahi Revenge Squad" was distributed naming 23 active leaders, including all of the militant members of the workplace shora, threatening them with execu tion if they did not resign from their jobs. By the end of the week, they were all either arrested (one was later executed) or were forced to go into hiding. The day after the explosion in the Islamic Republican Party headquarters, another fifty workers were arrested.
A few weeks later, about 1,500 temporary (contract) workers were given the choice of signing a new contract or getting the sack. The agreement put before them included a clause giving the management the right to terminate the contract whenever it wished to. There were, of course, protests, but under the circumstances, they got nowhere. (3)
In the industrial city of Alborz, near Ghazvin, on the night of June 21 (the day when the armed thugs of hezbollah machine-gunned a demonstration of over 300,000 persons in Tehran), pasdars raided the homes of many militant workers. They arrested over 200 persons (of whom 17 were executed). In the days that followed, many factories were occupied by the repressive forces.
In the Parchin factory (part of the arms industry) on June 22, 57 workers were arrested, and the independent shora was replaced by a reactionary one appointed from above.
In the General Motors factory in Tehran, on June 29, all the leading activists were arrested. On July 5, pasdars were at the factory gate with a list of names provided by the anjoman. Over a hundred workers were arrested that day, and another hundred a week later.
In the Benz-e-Khavar auto factory, on the night of June 28, pasdars raided the homes of the leaders of the shora and arrested three of them. The next day, one of them was whipped in front of the workforce. He was later executed. The anjoman also gave the names of 54 militants to the management. All of the named workers were either arrested or sacked. In this way, the independent anjoman was destroyed.
In the Iran Yasa tire factory, on June 28, all members of the shora were taken to the Labour Ministry and forced to resign without being allowed to explain their reasons. Obviously, they were threatened with imprisonment or execution. The militant mood of the workers in this factory, however, kept the regime from resorting to violence immediately. The repression there began later, in the autumn of 1981, with a total ban on the shora.
In the Tehran Bus Company, which had been involved in a labour dispute for almost a month, the situation was "normalized" by the arrest of all the militant members of the shora on July 4. Baseeji were brought in to keep an eye on every department.
These attacks on the working class were raised to a special intensity whenever any member of the regime was killed. The day after the explosion in the IRP headquarters, for example, in Tehran alone a convoy of forty buses went to the gates of most of the factories on the TehranKaraj Road arresting militant workers fingered by the anjomans. Many of those arrested at that time have yet to be released. A lot of them were executed. Those who were eventually released lost their jobs.
In the Iran National factory over 700 workers (out of a workforce of 8,000) were layed off. Some of them were allowed back after passing an "ideological test" administed by the anjoman.
3. All the incidents cited in this article have been based either on reports from the Iranian Fourth Internationalists or reports that have appeared in the journals of other left groups. In all cases, a comparison has been made between the various reports of the same incidents. Author's note. International Viewpoint 25 November 1985
The powerful oil workers had kept their shora. A section of them in the Shiraz refinery had been involved in a dispute with the Oil Ministry that started long before the wave of terror. They had planned the eleventh meeting of the National Shora to deal with this dispute and to organize solidarity actions with the Shiraz workers.
This meeting fell on June 23-24, that is, just a few days after the terror began. Delegates were reluctant to call for an all-out strike. They limited themselves to a resolution calling for some mild solidarity measures.
Five days later at the Tehran refinery, as soon as workers got out of the buses, they were confronted by a joint force of anjoman guards and pasdars. Many were beaten up on the spot, and many more were arrested, including all the militant shora members.
In the Pars Elektrik factory, the Islamic Anjoman organized a sit-in demanding the sacking of 15 workers. The management, of course, immediately acceded to this demand. When workers protested on the following day, a further 150 were sacked. By the end of July the number of those arrested and laid off had reached 300. On August 25, six leaders were executed. To put down any possible protests, pasdars occupied the facory.
It was by means of such vicious attacks that the workers' resistance was eventually broken. Gradually, all over the country, all the remaining shoras were crushed. Once that was accomplished, new offensives were launched. No "pagan" ideas allowed
The workers' share of the annual profits (set at 20% under the shah) was already cancelled in 1980. This aroused many protests, which had forced the regime to retreat. The authorities had promised that for the coming year, a new plan would be introduced. After the workers' resistance was crushed, in August, the "new" plan was made public. It had nothing to do with profit sharing, which was labeled a «Taghooti," that is, a "pagan" idea.
Rather, workers were promised a one percent increase in wages for every one percent increase in output, calculated on the basis of a "standard level" fixed by the Ministry of Labour. Those workers in factories producing below 65% of this level would receive nothing, and those in factories producing between 65% and 100% of the norm only 0.2% for every one percent increase in output. Under the circumstances, the authorities could expect
International Viewpoint 25 November 1985
An Iranian soldier assists his companion at the Iran-Iraq front (DR) that there would be no serious protests.
On August 30, the new minister of oil, Gharazi, who was considered a "maktabi" (literally, a scholastic, that is, an Islamic fundamentalist, a maktab being a religious school), announced another plan. Thursday closings were to be ended. (Since the Islamic sabbath is Friday, Thursday corresponds in Islamic countries to the Western Saturday.)
A 44-hour week was to be applied throughout the oil industry. There were protests, but none succeeded in changing the mind of the minister. All those workers who defied the new hours and stayed away on Thursdays were immediately sacked.
In Tehran, Esfahan, and Shiraz, many oil workers were arrested. To further weaken the oil workers, many South Korean and Pakistani skilled workers and technicians were brought in to replace discontented workers.
In most factories, a "code of discipline" was imposed, laying down a whole list of offenses for which a worker could be sacked. Among them were "any form of insult against the Islamic Republic" and "all kinds of disturbing the minds of the workers as regards the Islamic Republic." (From the code of discipline of the group of factories belonging to the National Shoe Co.)
Despite everything, there were a number of strikes in this period (we know of 14). Most of them, however, were bloodily suppressed, sometimes after an initial retreat by the authorities.
At the Starlite factory (with a mostly female workforce of over
1,200), there was a mass assembly on September 15 in protest against arbitrary sackings of women workers whom the maktabi manager aceused of not respecting Islamic hejab (that is, the obligation of women to cover their distinctively female features, which when interpreted strictly can mean shrouding themselves completely in a sort of black tent).
At first, the management did not make any moves. But by the end of the week, one of the women workers had been executed and 58 arrested. In early October, the management sacked the elected representative of the workers in the consumer cooperative. At the end of October, the management announced plans for increasing productivity without any wage increases (to aid the "war effort"").
The workers responded with a goslow. Two workers were arrested. On November 3, the workers went on strike. The next day, six more workers were sacked. The struggle then ended in a defeat.
In Iran National, a strike began on December 4. The workers were protesting against the proposals to cancel their right to buy a car every few years at the factory price. The Islamic anjoman warned against any "Monafaghin" conspiracy. (This term means literally hypocrite" and is generally applied by fundamentalists to left and liberal Moslems.)
The Minister of Labour and a group of pasdars came to the factory the next day to try to persuade the workers to end the strike. The workers gave notice that if by December 13, a new proposal was not made. They would resume industrial action.
On the same day, the labour minister, Tavakoli, appeared on national TV denouncing the workers as "profiteers" and "responsible for the black market." The strength of the pasdar units inside the factory was tripled. On December 13, arrests began. Almost 400 workers lost their jobs. The repressive forces opened fire on the workers, wounding many and killing at least one.
The only successful strike in this entire period took place in the Skuip factory on August 25. It was a protest against a management that was blatantly cheating the workers in its calculations of their over-time pay.
In this period, the regime of the mullahs was preparing the ground for its plan to normalize the economy and to bring back the capitalists. This was to be capped by new labour laws, around which a fight had been going on since the February 1979 insurrection. (4)
4. See "Clergy serves Mammon, but badly," in "International Viewpoint," No 85, October 28, 1985.