Iran’s president-elect Mahmood Ahmadinejad has hailed his election win as a new Islamic revolution which he said he hoped would now spread its way throughout the world.
‘Thanks to the blood of the martyrs, a new Islamic revolution has arisen and the Islamic revolution of 1384 (the current Iranian year) will, if God wills, cut off the roots of injustice in the world,’ the IRNA Iranian news agency quoted the adherent of Ayatollah Khomeini, the leader of the 1979 Iranian revolution, as saying.
He added: ‘The era of oppression, hegemonic regimes, tyranny and injustice has reached its end,’ referring to the role of US imperialism and its allies in the Gulf and the Middle East.
He added for good measure: ‘The wave of the Islamic revolution will soon reach the entire world.’
President elect Ahmadinejad made these comments to the families of over 70 martyrs, including several MPs and a former chief justice, killed in a 1981 attack on the headquarters of the post-revolutionary Islamic Republic Party.
His remarks marked the re-emergence of the ideas and movements of the first years of the 1979 Iranian revolution, when the regime prided itself on being the leaders of the oppressed not just in Iran, but throughout the world, and encouraged the oppressed outside Iran to take the road of revolution.
Ahmadinejad extolled the ‘purity’ of those early revolutionary days, which caused all of the Gulf regimes to tremble, and which saw the likes of Donald Rumsfeld skurry to Iraq to enthusiastically encourage, aid and arm Iraq’s leader, Saddam Hussein, to continue the war with Iran.
Ahmadinejad’s remarks have revolutionary implications first of all for Iran, where the working class and the poor, who put him into office, are on the march against the privatisation policies of the ruling clerics.
These have enriched themselves since the death of Khomeini. One of the reasons why Rafsanjani lost the presidential election is that he is viewed by the masses as one of a group of multi-millionaires who run the country and profit out of their misery.
The election of Ahmadinejad, as the representative of the poor, has not been greeted with rapture by the ruling clerics, who are concerned about his pledges, including the redistribution of Iran’s oil wealth amongst the working class and the poor.
Then there is the international policy of the Islamic Republic, which has had an opportunist relationship with the imperialists.
Iran has refused to use its influence in Afghanistan, and has let the US and its allies get on with their dirty work.
In Iraq, parties that spent 20 years in Tehran from 1979 onwards, are now at the heart of the puppet regime which is supporting the US occupation.
The Dawa Party is playing a leading role in this government and is also running southern Iraq for the British army occupiers, generally keeping it relatively quiet.
Any change in Iran as a result of the presidential election cannot fail to be reflected amongst the Shi’ite masses in southern Iraq, which will mean a major weakening of the puppet regime in Baghdad, a much bigger threat to British forces in the south, and a major expansion of the insurgency.
Similarly, President elect Ahmadinejad’s remarks will be taken up by large numbers of Shi’ites in the Lebanon, and will rattle all of the US’ client regimes in the Gulf, as well as being reflected in another rise in oil prices.
With the tide of revolution rising in the East, now is the time for the working class of the west to strike the heaviest blows possible against the imperialist powers at home. In Britain, this means the trade unions taking action to bring down the Blair government to go forward to a workers’ government that will carry out socialist policies at home and abroad. Such an action will transform the entire world situation.
