A Man of the People's Needs and Wants
Ahmadinejad Praised in Iran as a Caring Leader
By Karl Vick
Washington Post Foreign Service
Saturday, June 3, 2006; A01
ARAK, Iran -- The ordinary Iranians who poured into the local soccer stadium to hear President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad one day last month arrived carrying high hopes and handwritten letters. They left with just the hopes. The letters were collected in oversize cardboard boxes, then hoisted into the postal van Ahmadinejad has taken to parking prominently when he barnstorms the provinces, in an audacious campaign to make every Iranian's wish come true.
"I asked for a proper house," Vaziolla Rezaei, 57, said of the appeal he addressed to His Excellency the President of the Islamic Republic of Iran. "And I also told him about my financial situation."
"I mainly wrote about my husband's lack of work," said Kobra Hedyatti, 30. "And also about our poor house and how far the children have to walk to school."
"I actually wrote him two letters," said Reza Karimi, 41. "One was about the problems we have in this neighborhood. The other was about my problems.
"Of course," Karimi added with a wave of the hand, "I do not expect him to answer me individually. But I believe he would at least solve the problem of the neighborhood.
"I believe if he really could, he would help us."
That belief, far more than anything Ahmadinejad has said about nuclear power or the Holocaust, defines Iran's energetic president for the people who elected him almost a year ago, as well as the legions he appears to have won over since taking office in August. If his image in the West is that of a banty radical dangerously out of touch with reality -- "a psychopath of the worst kind," in the words of Israel's prime minister -- the prevailing impression in Iran is precisely the opposite.
Here, ordinary people marvel at how their president comes across as someone in touch, as populist candidate turned caring incumbent. In speeches, 17-hour workdays and biweekly trips like the one that brought him here to Central Province, Ahmadinejad showcases a relentless preoccupation with the health, housing and, most of all, money problems that may barely register on the global agenda but represent the most clear and present danger for most in this nation of 70 million.
"It's good to have a very kind person near you, caring about your problems," said Akram Rashidi, 34, at the counter of a stationery store where the run on envelopes outpaced the supply of change. "The important thing is that the president and important people are caring about the people."
Ahmadinejad's ardent professions of solidarity with workaday Iranians defined his dark-horse campaign a year ago. But once in office, he took retail politics to a whole new level. The visit to Arak in mid-May was his 13th trip to the provinces, each time dragging along his cabinet in the name of bringing the government to the people.
"He made a lot of promises," said Aynollah Bagheri, 30, in nearby Khomein, one of eight towns the president hit in two days. "I can't remember them all."
The pledges -- of higher wages, housing loans, recreational centers, car factories -- already are stacked to a precarious height. And he's only halfway through Iran's 30 provinces.
"He's in a perpetual campaign, and he's doing pretty well," said an Iranian political analyst who asked not to be identified because his employer had not authorized him to speak. "But there'll come a time pretty soon when he'll have to pay a second visit to these provinces.
"We are in the stage of hope and demands. If he's successful, he'll turn these demands into results. If he doesn't, there may come a point where complaints turn into anger."
For the time being, Ahmadinejad's image at home stands in stark counterpoint to his notoriety elsewhere. Scrappy and bellicose to the West, his presidency has distinguished itself inside Iran by an almost total absence of pain.
Iran remains Iran, of course. Controls on the press are firmer than ever, and the April arrest of Ramin Jahanbegloo, a philosopher without a strong reputation for political activism, has both mystified and unsettled elements of Tehran's professional class.
But Ahmadinejad's government has delivered none of the widely predicted crackdowns on social behavior. Iranians remain free to drink, party and generally do as they please behind closed doors. In public, young couples can still canoodle lightly on the street, and young women stretch the definition of "Islamic dress" with form-fitting outerwear.
In fact, the hard-line president last month stunned conservatives and liberals alike by ordering the national stadium opened to female soccer fans, an egalitarian gesture that was thwarted when clerics appealed directly to Iran's unelected supreme leader.
But Ahmadinejad's primary focus is the ordinary people normally paid little notice by the country's insular, elitist political culture except at election time.
Ahmadinejad addresses them personally. "I love you too," he told the cheering crowd in Arak. But the only part of the speech heard in the world beyond Iran was what he said about Europe's emerging offer of incentives if Iran abandoned uranium enrichment: "walnuts for gold."
In the audience, Rezaei barely noticed that part.
"The main emphasis of his speech is that he's going to raise up the people who have been deprived of a good life," said Rezaei, who makes his living ambling along the sidewalks of Arak, one hand on a clarinet that plays a flowing, upbeat tune, the other on a crutch. "His main point is he's going to bring a balance between people who have a lot of money and the poor. He's going to give them opportunity. This was the point people loved very much."
The response has been overwhelming in more ways than one. When Ahmadinejad offered Iranians low-interest loans for housing, his office prepared for 30,000 applications. It received 2 million. Other new programs offer loans to newlyweds, farmers, villagers and small businesses.
"Each day we get between 130 and 150 requests," said Hamed Alizadeh at the walk-up window at an office in Tehran, set up around the corner from the modest townhome that symbolized Ahmadinejad's personal integrity during the campaign.
Labeled "President's Public Relations Office," the window receives hand-delivered letters from 8 to 5:30 six days a week. Alizadeh, part of a constituent service staff of 200, runs a highlighter over each essential passage, fills out a form for the relevant ministry, then hands the citizen a phone number to call after 10 days.
The requests can be amusing, he said: One woman wanted the president to find her a husband. But seven in 10 ask for money. The president's visit to Iran's poorest province, Sistan and Baluchistan, brought 200,000 letters alone.
"Everybody is saying he will actually solve the problems, so I've come all this way," said Ashraf Samadi, 47, who borrowed $320 from neighbors for the 16-hour bus ride to Tehran to deliver her letter in person. She wanted funds for a son's failing kidney and a daughter's wedding.
"Is there any chance of seeing the president himself?" she asked.
For a politician, the consequences of disappointing such achingly personal hopes could be catastrophic. But Ahmadinejad's government has been cushioned by the flood of revenue from oil exports at $70 a barrel, a price that in part reflects markets made nervous by his belligerent remarks on nuclear power and Israel.
To many Iranians, the tough talk is simply that. Among a population with both the pride of the Persian empire and a long history of defensive wars, Ahmadinejad's defiance is regarded as welcome and routine. "These kinds of words have to be used," said Azar Mahdavi, 20, behind the counter of a children's boutique. "You have to show that you're a strong man."
Some citizens even resent attention to any issue beyond themselves. One placard in Arak read: "A better life is our undeniable right" -- a pointed play on the government's constant pro-nuclear slogan. Union members at a May Day rally chanted, "Forget about Palestine. What about us?"
"People have high expectations," said Rashidi, at the stationery shop. Her look was introspective as she told of accompanying her sister to see Ahmadinejad when he was still Tehran's mayor, to appeal a zoning issue. There was no result, but what she remembered, years later, was having his attention.
In Khomein, Zabihollah Sarlak asked Ahmadinejad to see that his mentally disabled son is looked after if he should die. "He promised everybody, but he also said it'll take some time," said Sarlak, 50. "He said if you buy a kilo of meat at the market and take it home and cook it, it takes time.
"But he'll do what he says."
By Karl Vick
Washington Post Foreign Service
Saturday, June 3, 2006; A01
ARAK, Iran -- The ordinary Iranians who poured into the local soccer stadium to hear President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad one day last month arrived carrying high hopes and handwritten letters. They left with just the hopes. The letters were collected in oversize cardboard boxes, then hoisted into the postal van Ahmadinejad has taken to parking prominently when he barnstorms the provinces, in an audacious campaign to make every Iranian's wish come true.
"I asked for a proper house," Vaziolla Rezaei, 57, said of the appeal he addressed to His Excellency the President of the Islamic Republic of Iran. "And I also told him about my financial situation."
"I mainly wrote about my husband's lack of work," said Kobra Hedyatti, 30. "And also about our poor house and how far the children have to walk to school."
"I actually wrote him two letters," said Reza Karimi, 41. "One was about the problems we have in this neighborhood. The other was about my problems.
"Of course," Karimi added with a wave of the hand, "I do not expect him to answer me individually. But I believe he would at least solve the problem of the neighborhood.
"I believe if he really could, he would help us."
That belief, far more than anything Ahmadinejad has said about nuclear power or the Holocaust, defines Iran's energetic president for the people who elected him almost a year ago, as well as the legions he appears to have won over since taking office in August. If his image in the West is that of a banty radical dangerously out of touch with reality -- "a psychopath of the worst kind," in the words of Israel's prime minister -- the prevailing impression in Iran is precisely the opposite.
Here, ordinary people marvel at how their president comes across as someone in touch, as populist candidate turned caring incumbent. In speeches, 17-hour workdays and biweekly trips like the one that brought him here to Central Province, Ahmadinejad showcases a relentless preoccupation with the health, housing and, most of all, money problems that may barely register on the global agenda but represent the most clear and present danger for most in this nation of 70 million.
"It's good to have a very kind person near you, caring about your problems," said Akram Rashidi, 34, at the counter of a stationery store where the run on envelopes outpaced the supply of change. "The important thing is that the president and important people are caring about the people."
Ahmadinejad's ardent professions of solidarity with workaday Iranians defined his dark-horse campaign a year ago. But once in office, he took retail politics to a whole new level. The visit to Arak in mid-May was his 13th trip to the provinces, each time dragging along his cabinet in the name of bringing the government to the people.
"He made a lot of promises," said Aynollah Bagheri, 30, in nearby Khomein, one of eight towns the president hit in two days. "I can't remember them all."
The pledges -- of higher wages, housing loans, recreational centers, car factories -- already are stacked to a precarious height. And he's only halfway through Iran's 30 provinces.
"He's in a perpetual campaign, and he's doing pretty well," said an Iranian political analyst who asked not to be identified because his employer had not authorized him to speak. "But there'll come a time pretty soon when he'll have to pay a second visit to these provinces.
"We are in the stage of hope and demands. If he's successful, he'll turn these demands into results. If he doesn't, there may come a point where complaints turn into anger."
For the time being, Ahmadinejad's image at home stands in stark counterpoint to his notoriety elsewhere. Scrappy and bellicose to the West, his presidency has distinguished itself inside Iran by an almost total absence of pain.
Iran remains Iran, of course. Controls on the press are firmer than ever, and the April arrest of Ramin Jahanbegloo, a philosopher without a strong reputation for political activism, has both mystified and unsettled elements of Tehran's professional class.
But Ahmadinejad's government has delivered none of the widely predicted crackdowns on social behavior. Iranians remain free to drink, party and generally do as they please behind closed doors. In public, young couples can still canoodle lightly on the street, and young women stretch the definition of "Islamic dress" with form-fitting outerwear.
In fact, the hard-line president last month stunned conservatives and liberals alike by ordering the national stadium opened to female soccer fans, an egalitarian gesture that was thwarted when clerics appealed directly to Iran's unelected supreme leader.
But Ahmadinejad's primary focus is the ordinary people normally paid little notice by the country's insular, elitist political culture except at election time.
Ahmadinejad addresses them personally. "I love you too," he told the cheering crowd in Arak. But the only part of the speech heard in the world beyond Iran was what he said about Europe's emerging offer of incentives if Iran abandoned uranium enrichment: "walnuts for gold."
In the audience, Rezaei barely noticed that part.
"The main emphasis of his speech is that he's going to raise up the people who have been deprived of a good life," said Rezaei, who makes his living ambling along the sidewalks of Arak, one hand on a clarinet that plays a flowing, upbeat tune, the other on a crutch. "His main point is he's going to bring a balance between people who have a lot of money and the poor. He's going to give them opportunity. This was the point people loved very much."
The response has been overwhelming in more ways than one. When Ahmadinejad offered Iranians low-interest loans for housing, his office prepared for 30,000 applications. It received 2 million. Other new programs offer loans to newlyweds, farmers, villagers and small businesses.
"Each day we get between 130 and 150 requests," said Hamed Alizadeh at the walk-up window at an office in Tehran, set up around the corner from the modest townhome that symbolized Ahmadinejad's personal integrity during the campaign.
Labeled "President's Public Relations Office," the window receives hand-delivered letters from 8 to 5:30 six days a week. Alizadeh, part of a constituent service staff of 200, runs a highlighter over each essential passage, fills out a form for the relevant ministry, then hands the citizen a phone number to call after 10 days.
The requests can be amusing, he said: One woman wanted the president to find her a husband. But seven in 10 ask for money. The president's visit to Iran's poorest province, Sistan and Baluchistan, brought 200,000 letters alone.
"Everybody is saying he will actually solve the problems, so I've come all this way," said Ashraf Samadi, 47, who borrowed $320 from neighbors for the 16-hour bus ride to Tehran to deliver her letter in person. She wanted funds for a son's failing kidney and a daughter's wedding.
"Is there any chance of seeing the president himself?" she asked.
For a politician, the consequences of disappointing such achingly personal hopes could be catastrophic. But Ahmadinejad's government has been cushioned by the flood of revenue from oil exports at $70 a barrel, a price that in part reflects markets made nervous by his belligerent remarks on nuclear power and Israel.
To many Iranians, the tough talk is simply that. Among a population with both the pride of the Persian empire and a long history of defensive wars, Ahmadinejad's defiance is regarded as welcome and routine. "These kinds of words have to be used," said Azar Mahdavi, 20, behind the counter of a children's boutique. "You have to show that you're a strong man."
Some citizens even resent attention to any issue beyond themselves. One placard in Arak read: "A better life is our undeniable right" -- a pointed play on the government's constant pro-nuclear slogan. Union members at a May Day rally chanted, "Forget about Palestine. What about us?"
"People have high expectations," said Rashidi, at the stationery shop. Her look was introspective as she told of accompanying her sister to see Ahmadinejad when he was still Tehran's mayor, to appeal a zoning issue. There was no result, but what she remembered, years later, was having his attention.
In Khomein, Zabihollah Sarlak asked Ahmadinejad to see that his mentally disabled son is looked after if he should die. "He promised everybody, but he also said it'll take some time," said Sarlak, 50. "He said if you buy a kilo of meat at the market and take it home and cook it, it takes time.
"But he'll do what he says."
posted by Hanan Elbadry at 10:44 AM
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