Anti-government protests have sprung up in Iranian cities and towns where the country’s clerical leaders traditionally enjoy a large base of support.
But without a clear leader to rally around, the demonstrations, which have led to a brutal crackdown, dozens of deaths and at least 1,000 arrests, could help to strengthen the position of conservative hardliners in Iran’s government, a UBC academic told Global News.
They could “effectively turn the people against the moderates… strengthening their position domestically,” said UBC lecturer Parmida Esmaeilpour.
Anti-government protests appear to be dying down in the Islamic Republic after more than a week.
The protestors are “pointing out the corruption in the clerical establishment,” said Bessma Momani, a senior fellow at the Centre for International Governance and Innovation and professor of Political Science and International Relations at the University of Waterloo.
“That’s really divergent or a change in what we have seen in the past and I actually think it’s quite significant.”
Demonstrators have chanted for Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s death, but they’ve also focused on inflation and the high cost of living.
“This is the bread and butter of the regime. What they really want is not to pay an extra 40 per cent for chicken and eggs,” Momani said.
Momani speculated that clerics may have tried to instigate the current protests in an effort to blame President Hassan Rouhani, a reformist.
Esmaeilpour said conservatives could convince the public that moderates have been unable to provide for the Iranian people – and solidify their position in the process.
And a recent leak of Iranian budgetary items might have been an attempt by Rouhani to turn the heat off himself, and on to the hardliners,Momani said.
Among other things, they showed that the clerics were given billions to pay for religious libraries.
Class is also playing a role in the protests.
In December, the Iranian president released the 2018 budget, announcing that the government would cut off government subsidies and services to those who needed them the most.
An Instagram account called the “Rich Kids of Tehran” has also added fuel to the fire of class division in the country.
It’s a social media account in which young, urban Iranians flaunt their designer clothes and lavish pool-side mansions.
On Monday, Rouhani targeted his hardline opponents, saying the protesters were seeking a better life, and were frustrated not just with the economy but also corruption and the clerical government’s restrictions on personal freedoms.
“I think we are seeing some inter-fighting” within various factions of the regime, Momani said.
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