Linking the economic action of the bazaar and shopkeepers to the Woman, Life, Freedom revolution

What he says

An English translation of the talk, which is in Persian. It was made with AI from YouTube's automatic captions and may contain errors; the Persian transcript is authoritative. Click a timestamp to jump to that part of the video.

0:01 Hello. It is Monday, 8 Dey 1404, December 29, 2025. The protest by the shopkeepers and bazaar merchants of Tehran, which began yesterday, grew wider today. Beyond the Grand Bazaar of Tehran and the shopkeepers of Sirus Street and the surrounding area, up to Saray-e Amin Hozour, and on the other side as far as Molavi Street and so on, it spread to other parts of the city as well. The shopkeepers cannot make ends meet. The bazaar merchants, with the shaky economic situation, runaway inflation, and the recession that has gripped the economy, cannot carry on with their work. This gives them every right

1:00 to protest, and quite rightly they close their shops in protest and come out into the streets. A greater danger lies in wait: for some time now, Iran's leading economists have been warning that hyperinflation is on the way. Hyperinflation does not mean that the current inflation of, say, 50 or 60 percent becomes 80, 90 or 100 percent. Rather, it is a phenomenon that, like an avalanche coming down a mountain, swallows everything in its path. In effect, like a chain reaction, once inflation passes a certain level, these same shopkeepers have no other choice;

1:57 their shops close down. Because people stop buying, production units shut down one after another. The very shutdowns and the slowdown in production and so on intensify inflation further, and in effect the wheels of the country's economy stop turning, and the situation goes from bad to worse, and at an accelerating pace. Economists have been giving this warning for some time, saying that the continuation of the current situation has put the Iranian economy in this danger. As for what must be done, it is clear that, for example, replacing Mr. Farzin with Mr. Hemmati will not change anything, because this same Mr. Hemmati was previously Minister of Economy and Finance and was also head of the Central Bank,

2:57 and in fact the Central Bank is part of a larger structure, and if those structures do not change, the Central Bank alone or the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Finance alone can achieve nothing. The larger structure that has brought the country's economy to this point is, in fact, the structure of the Velayat-e Faqih system, in which one person called the Supreme Leader has seized half of the country's wealth, the IRGC, which is subordinate to him, has seized another 30 percent, widespread corruption has spread through the pillars of government like a cancer, and the mafia gangs of wealth and power have effectively crippled the proper and healthy functioning of the economy. On the other hand, a wrong foreign policy and the

4:03 46-year-old slogan of eradicating Israel and hostility toward America, and insisting on them, have dragged the issue at the international level into sanctions, isolation and so on; along with fruitless projects like the nuclear project, which has squandered the country's wealth for 25 years, or projects like the proxy forces, which in effect have been the promotion of terrorism and have spent the country's resources on terrorist organizations outside Iran; and inside Iran too, strange and bizarre institutions for the promotion of Islam and culture and so on, which are attached to the Supreme Leader and also take huge sums from public budgets. All of these

4:55 structures, taken together, have in fact created a situation. On top of that is the Constitution of the Islamic Republic itself, which in fact has many knots and tangles and deprives the executive branches of the possibility of smooth management. They have created the situation we are witnessing right now. Therefore, the solution is not really replacing Mr. Farzin with Hemmati, or this minister or that minister. When the economy is in such a situation, the solution becomes feasible through major political turns and major structural changes and surgeries. The unions of various guilds, which usually, in these kinds of

5:54 demonstrations, some of them unfortunately are so-called "yellow" unions. The government has for years interfered in guild elections. Not only the guilds and shopkeepers, but in the Islamic labor councils, in the Bar Association, in the Medical Council, in the people's civil organizations, the government has for years tried to infiltrate them, get its hands on them and make them so-called "yellow," so that they never act against the government's wishes. For this reason, with this protest by the shopkeepers, which has real depth, in fact economic and political depth, in the country, one must be vigilant and careful that it does not become a plaything of the backroom deals of a number of

6:51 people in the guild unions and so on, who have a corner shop with two fronts: one front facing the government and the other facing the people. Of course, of course, in just these two days it was seen that the demonstrations, even of the shopkeepers, apart from the people who joined them, quickly took on a political direction toward changing the regime, and slogans that target the foundations of the regime, such as "Reza Shah, may your soul rest in peace," or "Neither Gaza nor Lebanon, I give my life for Iran," or "Death to the dictator," "Death to Khamenei," and so on, clearly show that the guilds and bazaar merchants also know and understand that in fact the fundamental problem lies in the structure of the whole system, and in a system which, if we are to put a name on it,

7:49 is the Velayat-e Faqih system, which must be destroyed. In any case, the movement, the protest that has begun with the shopkeepers and bazaar merchants, can gain depth and breadth only if, on the one hand, its breadth spreads to other cities, to other provinces, and the shopkeepers and bazaar merchants of the country's other large and small cities join Tehran and support it; and second, if it also gains depth vertically, and that means other classes joining them: workers, teachers, nurses, medical staff, retirees, and in general fixed-wage earners, who more than anyone are under

8:44 the pressure of the inflationary situation. And let us also remember that a great social and cultural revolution has shown its face since 1401 and is moving powerfully in our society, and that is the Woman, Life, Freedom revolution. This revolution, at whose center stood women and young people, has also conquered important strongholds such as compulsory hijab, has moved forward, and is busy conquering other strongholds, such as separating the way people live from the government, or in the fields of art, in various cultural fields, in fact especially the way of life, the lifestyle.

9:44 This deep social revolution has broken the model that the government has tried for 46 years to impose on the people, and it is in fact advancing stronghold by stronghold in the depths of our society. Therefore, linking this deep social and cultural revolution, which in fact came into public view in 1401, though it had been moving gradually for 46 years to reach this point, with economic demands will multiply the energy of the movement several times over. One of the important links in society that can connect this deep social and cultural movement of our society to the economic demands that right now, more than anything

10:43 else, are tormenting people, are the university students, who have the standing and the ability to do so, and who hold the stronghold of the university. From the university, with slogans beyond the economic ones, slogans of Woman, Life, Freedom and of the great cultural and social movement of Iranian society, they can effectively connect this great energy of society, these two great energies, to each other. We will talk more about this. Hoping for the victory of Iran and Iranians.