Food Baskets for the Faithful Servants

On October 9, centrist Asr-e Iran News Agency published a letter from the Health Ministry’s welfare directorate. The letter ordered 2,600 food baskets for ministry employees from ETKA, the Defense Ministry’s chain store company. The letter offers a glimpse into how the regime is trying to secure the loyalty of public servants amid inflation and the deprivations of the war economy. The request likely mirrors similar orders across government agencies. In parallel, aid and relief agencies and mosque networks are likely distributing goods to the needy, buying further loyalty to the regime. Yet the same policy may alienate those left outside the circle of recipients. Iranians who have no access to food baskets suffer the war economy’s hardships unaided, and they see public funds spent on others. Asr-e Iran’s question to its readers gives voice to that resentment.

• October 9: Centrist Asr-e Iran News Agency released a letter Davoud Shamsi, the director of Health Ministry Logistics and Welfare, wrote to Seyyed Ali Mousavi, director of ETKA Chain Stores Company, a subsidiary of Iran’s Ministry of Defense and Armed Forces Logistics. In its analysis of the letter, Asr-e Iran News Agency asked: “For many readers the question arises: While the government spends from the country’s public budget to raise the salaries and improve the livelihood of its own employees, where is the share of the public budget for the rest of the people, who are not government employees?”
  • The text of the letter from the Iranian Health Ministry to Mousavi read: “Mousavi, esteemed chief executive officer of ETKA stores. Greetings and respects. With regard to the programs underway at this General Directorate for providing welfare services to our esteemed colleagues, please kindly instruct that the necessary action be taken, with urgency, to submit a pro forma invoice and to prepare and deliver the items listed below:
    • Lamb meat: 2,600 units of 3 kilos each, Etka Protein.
    • Veal leg: 2,600 units of 2 kilos each, Etka Protein.
    • Pink rainbow trout fillet: 2,600 units of 2 kilos each.
    • Boneless chicken thigh: 2,600 units of 2.5 kilos each, Samin.
    • Boneless chicken breast: 2,600 units of 2.5 kilos each, Samin.
    • Iranian rice: 2,600 units of 10 kilos each, premium Hashemi from Gilan.
    • Palm-free cooking oil: 2,600 units of 1.350 kilos each, Oila.
    • Palm-free clear frying oil: 2,600 units of 1.350 kilos each, Oila.
    • Premium odorless olive oil: 2,600 units of 500 grams each.
    • Liqvan cheese: 2,600 units of 500 grams each.
    • Premium Mazafati dates: 2,600 units of 1 kilo each.
    • Spice pack (turmeric, curry powder, black pepper, ginger powder, garlic powder, and chicken and fish seasoning): 2,600 units of 100 grams each, Golestan.
    • Coconut-filled chocolates: 2,600 units of 500 grams each, Bounty.
    • Pastilles: 2,600 units of 400 grams each.
    • Box and packaging.”

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