Workers in the Kashmir Wool Works in the Kurdish city of Kermanshah held a demonstration July 4 in front of the provincial office of Labor and Social Affairs to protest the agency's decision to uphold the layoffs of their coworkers, reported the Iranian Student News Agency (ISNA). Some of the coworkers who were laid off had worked there for 10 years and had not received wages or benefits since 1999.

This action followed a successful demonstration by textile workers in Tehran that attracted national attention. Eight hundred workers from the Cheet-e-rey textile factory mobilized in front of the Majles (parliament) June 12. They had not been paid for two months and the new bosses who bought the factory last year had stopped production.

The owners had purchased the plant from Bonyade Mostazefan va Jonbazan (BMJ, Foundation of the Oppressed and Disabled Veterans), one of the bonyads, or foundations, that was created after the 1979 revolution. After many large landowners and capitalists fled the country following the revolution, the factories were taken over by workers and run by shoras (councils) for a brief period of time. The authorities then organized the bonyads and took over the factories and other confiscated property. BMJ took major responsibility for aiding wounded veterans of the Iran-Iraq war and helping the families of those who gave their lives to defend the revolution. In recent years, as part of the government's drive for privatization, the bonyads have begun to sell off some factories.

A Cheet-e-rey worker told ISNA that the BMJ "sold our factory to the private sector at a cheap price. The factory was very productive but because of the lack of raw material it rapidly deteriorated." He said those who bought the factory were involved in running the bonyad before. "When we go to the bosses to demand our rights they call us counterrevolutionaries," he said.

Another worker reminded the ISNA reporter of the proud record of the Cheet-e-rey worker-volunteers in defense of the revolution both at the front and behind the lines during the 1980–88 Iran-Iraq war. The new owners had no intention of running the factory, workers say, and instead wanted to declare bankruptcy and sell the plant and its 40 acres of land at a profit.

The next day the ranks of the demonstrators in front of the Majles swelled to more than 1,000 workers when a contingent from the Shadanpoor shoe factory joined in. They explained that they had not been paid for 10 months.

The workers chanted, "Majles, Majles, uproot the bonyad!" Participants told reporters that the Shadanpoor factory was run by the BMJ until they sold it to Rasekh Afshar, the son of the owner before the revolution. A member of the factory shora said that after the new boss took over he met with the workers and announced that he would hire 500 new people to double the work force. But that did not happen.  
 
'Giving workers the run around'
Instead, Afshar started to strip the factory, selling it piece by piece and saying that he was doing it in order to bring in new machinery. But the new equipment never appeared. Another worker told ISNA that the new boss "is heavily in debt and wants to pay it off by stripping off the factory. He is not interested in running production; he just wants to give workers the runaround." Workers are demanding their back wages and their jobs.

For weeks prior to taking their protest to the Majles, Cheet-e-rey workers had been demonstrating at labor and provincial offices. Workers told ISNA reporters at the demonstration that after their protests at the Majles they planned to gather in front of the house of head of state Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. It is Khamenei's office, not the Majles or any governmental agency, that has the authority to oversee the work of the bonyads.

The government settled the dispute with the Cheet-e-rey workers before the planned demonstration. They returned to their jobs June 16, four days after their first protest in front of the Majles.

Instead of taking the factory back as workers had demanded, the BMJ extended a substantial loan to the new owners of Cheet-e-rey to use for the payment of back wages.  
 
Opening up to imports
The government's ongoing drive to sell off state enterprises is opening the country up to more imports and intensified imperialist plunder with devastating social consequences. Alireza Mahjoub, a Majles deputy from Tehran and a trade union official, told the Financial Times July 3 that 1,400 companies are in a critical state following privatization. Some 80,000 workers are not being paid. If the government were to prevent workers from demonstrating, then there would be a "nationwide reply," he said.

Iran's House of Workers trade union federation has 2 million members. According to press reports, two years ago the federation used 30 percent of its dues money to support unpaid workers. Now it uses 60 percent.

In the aftermath of the protests by the Cheet-e-rey workers, the July 8 New York Times quoted Ahmad Meidari, a member of the Majles's Commission of Economy, as saying that "the government has now decided to go slow on privatization to avoid similar debacles." The BMJ has reportedly decided to take back several factories it had sold off, and the government has promised to use some of a $10 billion special fund from excess oil revenues to address the situation.  
 
 
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