In an audio file sent to Iran International and verified by our contacts, a man recounts the ordeal of contract workers in the companies active in oil, gas and petrochemical industries.

The worker especially talked about the case of himself and his colleagues working under contract by the Persian Gulf Petrochemical Industries Corporation, aka Persian Gulf Holding, where a $170-million embezzlement case at one of its subsidiaries put the company on spotlight last winter.

Persian Gulf Holding is a large Iranian quasi-governmental company that claims to be an independent entity but practically it is a large part of the government-controlled energy industry with 15 subsidiaries. Regime insider Abdolali Ali-Asgari – a former head of the country’s state broadcaster is the current CEO of the company.

Describing their situation as “stuck in hidden slavery,” the worker says the problems stem from the special status of a few well-connected senior managers and systematic corruption in the energy industry.

“Iran’s oil industry mafia takes advantage of the workers, especially project and contract workers, and forces them to work in terrible conditions,” he said.

With double-digit unemployment and ever-falling currency, workers have little choice to find other employment paying them more than the minimum wage of $120 a month.

Workers’ lives are not important for managers; wages are meager and are paid with delays; there are no weekend breaks; the managers are selected from those with links to senior officials and do not do anything but sit in their ivory towers with their laptops; and when workers go on strike to demand changes, the security forces threaten the them and their families to break their strikes. These are just some of the gravamina of the worker in his audio file.

He went on to say that several workers have died in the past few months due to non-compliance of companies with safety issues, but the authorities do not let such incidents to be reflected in mainstream media.

Read more on the original:

https://www.iranintl.com/en/202304237869

Also read this:

Oil Workers on Strike Across Iran

VOA

https://www.voanews.com/a/oil-workers-on-strike-across-iran-/7062683.html