In exile for forty-three years, Prince Reza Pahlavi, son of the last Shah of Iran and heir to the throne, now resides in the United States.
A fierce opponent of the theocratic regime in power in Iran, the 62-year-old prince could see his fight take a new turn as an online change.org campaign aims to propel him as a spokesperson for the 'opposition.
It all started on January 1, when a motley group of Iranian personalities, including the Crown Prince, Nobel laureate Shirin Ebadi, former footballer Ali Karimi and women's rights activist Masih Alinejad, simultaneously published a message of hope through their social media accounts.
“By organizing and standing together, 2023 will be the year of victory for the Iranian nation. The year of freedom and justice in Iran,” they wrote, implicitly pointing the way to united front against the regime.
A regime that has been suppressing for more than four months the protest movement provoked by the death of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old Iranian girl, following her arrest by the morality police for violating the dress code.
While the UN has counted 14,000 arrests since mid-September, the Norwegian NGO Iran Human Rights says at least 481 people have been killed and at least 109 people are at risk of execution in connection with the protests, in addition of the four already hanged.
A petition signed by more than
423,000
people
More than ten days after the January 1 message, Reza Pahlavi gave an interview on January 13 to Manoto TV, a royalist Iranian channel based in London, during which he pleaded in favor of the organization of elections. free and for the formation of a constituent assembly.
"Whatever we want to do, we must have legitimacy within the country, he however specified, when he was questioned on his role within the opposition. If we have to negotiate on the scene international community on behalf of our compatriots, we must be able to say that we are supported by political prisoners, civic activists and political currents and intellectuals inside the country, who give us a proxy to speak on their behalf."
It was enough for the Iranian actor Ehsan Karami, who lives in the United States, to launch an online petition on the Change.org site, entitled "Prince Reza Pahlavi is my representative".
براى امضاى كمپين اعطاى وكالت به شاه زاده رضا پهلوى به لينك زير ب؏ويد👇
— Ehsan Karami (@ehsaankaramy) January 17, 2023
A short introductory text explains the process, without making any mention of a possible restoration of the monarchy: "Given the revolution that is taking place in Iran and the fact that Prince Reza Pahlavi has asked the Iranian people to give him a power of attorney to lead this movement, this petition allows the Iranian people to express their opinion".
Since then, and to date, it has been signed by more than 423,000 people, including artists like Iranian actress Shohreh Aghdashloo and athletes like Ali Karimi, who gave his support "for the time of a transition", or again taekwondo champion Kimia Alizadeh, the first Olympic medalist in the history of her country.
#Iran's Taekwondo athlete and Olympic champion Kimiya Alizade has declared her support for Reza Pahlavi as a transition figure to succeed the Islamic Republic pic.twitter.com/awUB2s3QuM
— Arash Azizi آرش عزیزی (@arash_tehran) January 21, 2023
At the same time, on social networks, the hashtag #من_وکالت_میدهم (#you_represent_me), launched by journalist Saeed Hafezi, is taken up by thousands of Iranians, who sometimes accompany their tweet with a photo of Reza Pahlavi.
Even former political detainees like Amirhossein Moradi, or relatives of victims killed by the security forces since the beginning of the protest movement have publicly supported Reza Pahlavi, like Nasrine Shakarami, mother of Nika, a protester killed in the 16 years old, during the month of September.
An initiative that is causing debate in Iran and within the diaspora
For his part, Reza Pahlavi assured in an interview granted this week to Skynews "not to be a candidate for a post and not to seek a political position in the state apparatus […]."
"I prefer to be a defender of the people […]. I have no ambition for power or authority, he added, not without announcing that he was planning international trips in the coming weeks to discuss with officials and elected officials the steps to be taken to help Iran.
Before this digital referendum, the name of Reza Pahlavi had rarely been cited in Iran since the death of Mahsa Amini, explains an Iranian academic who requested anonymity to speak freely.
"However, even if his popularity and his political weight are difficult to measure, the son of the Shah is a well-known personality in the country, he underlines. Even and especially among young people, thanks in particular to the considerable impact of the channels television companies like Manoto and Iran International, open supporters of the monarchy".
While the petition has met with some success on social networks, this initiative is causing debate in Iran and within the diaspora, as demonstrated by the appearance of the hashtag, #من_وکالت_نمیدهم (#tu_me_pas-représentes), or anti- Pahlavi in Iranian streets.
Graffiti in an unidentified place in Iran: "A revolution that lives does not need a lawyer".
Probably in reference to the promotion of Reza Pahlavi as a representative of the opposition within a part of the diaspora pic.twitter.com/7O88rgGXFB
— Jonathan Piron (@jonathanpiron1) January 26, 2023
"This initiative and the idea that the Shah's son could represent the opposition has provoked a huge debate between those who dispute his legitimacy, because of the Pahlavi dynasty's heavy human rights record, and those who who believe that he is the only one, among Iranian personalities, to have the necessary aura to speak on behalf of the Iranian people", continues the academic.
Some even fear that it could harm the movement in the sense that it could feed the propaganda of the Iranian power which frequently describes the demonstrators as “rioters” manipulated by the “enemies” of Iran abroad.
Iranian STATE TV was quick to attack Reza Pahlavi, son of the last Shah of #Iran, whose online campaign claims he represents the Iranian opposition. "I have no job and it is my mother who pays the expenses of my life, ”says this hostile ad pic.twitter.com/gmf7DQDB0U
— Armin Arefi (@arminarefi) January 25, 2023
"The Islamic Republic was quick to instrumentalize the petition by minimizing its impact, pointing out the fact that 400,000 signatories cannot represent the opinion of the country's 87 million inhabitants, or even by ironizing the political weight of the son of the Shah", indicates the academic installed in France.
"It cannot represent the current movement on its own"
Arrested, placed in detention and "systematically tortured" on several occasions during the 1970s, when he was an active campaigner in the academic world in favor of democracy in Iran, Ebrahim* thus considers that "it is not a good idea" to entrust a role of spokesperson to Reza Pahlavi.
"As a victim of the dictatorship of the Shah and the Savak [the political police of the monarchy], I cannot support such an option even if the speech of Reza Pahlavi, who has never dissociated himself from the balance sheet of his father, seems to me clear and open to everyone", explains the one who took refuge in France in the early 1980s, to flee the repression of the Guardians of the Revolution.
"He cannot, and must not, alone represent the current movement in the country, it is neither in his interest nor in the interest of anyone".
"After forty-three years of the Islamic Republic, I am ready not to remain stuck on the past, nor on my own, even if I almost died under torture like some of my friends, nor on that of Reza Pahlavi, continues Ebrahim. The son of the Shah can if he wishes, provided that he commits himself against any kind of foreign interference in Iran and to clean up his entourage among those who display a spirit of revenge, participate in a such representation, but only in a plural framework by agreeing with other personalities and not only with some celebrities."
"Don't confuse Reza Pahlavi with his father"
Others believe, on the contrary, that no avenue should be overlooked that could allow the opposition to organize itself and unify its ranks in order to effectively face the Iranian regime and its repressive machine.
"No politician will ever be unanimous, but I remind you that Reza Pahlavi wrote three books in which he evokes the political heritage of his father and denounces the human rights violations that took place under the reign of Shah", confides to France 24 Me Sahand Saber, Franco-Iranian lawyer at the Paris bar.
Describing himself as a supporter of Reza Pahlavi and a pro-democracy activist, he calls "not to confuse the son who belongs to the 21st century, and who has never been in power in Iran and proposes a resolutely democratic and secular program, with his father who belongs to the twentieth century".
For Me Sahand Saber, the petition can allow Reza Pahlavi to know "whether or not he is entitled to temporarily carry, for the time of a transition, the voice of the Iranian people", and to the Iranians themselves "to nourish the debate to know who is entitled to represent them".
Even the international community "to know that there is a legitimate interlocutor" with whom to speak.
Graffiti in support of Prince #RezaPahlavi
A city in Iran - January 25, 2023 pic.twitter.com/1hzwDXd5Eg
— IranProtests.com (@IranProtestsCom) January 26, 2023
Asked about the possibility that the initiative could involuntarily serve the interests of power in Iran, Mr. Sahand Saber said he was confident because "the Iranians are not naive".
"They are intelligent enough to be wary of the official discourse of the ayatollahs' regime which will obviously instrumentalize this consultation, he underlines. I note moreover that several personalities living in Iran have expressly granted their support to Reza Pahlavi and signed the petition, which demonstrates that his voice also carries on the spot."
A heterogeneous opposition devoid of a leader
For the academic quoted above, the petition and the debate it sparked demonstrate that there is still no natural leader for the Iranian opposition.
"And this, even though, paradoxically, we are gradually arriving within Iranian public opinion at the conclusion that a theocratic regime cannot function in Iran, and that we are witnessing the beginning of the unification of the opposition abroad and even inside Iran".
According to him, Reza Pahlavi has so far failed to embody the alternative or to create an organization sufficiently influential to weigh within the Iranian opposition.
And not only because of the reservations about the monarchy that he embodies and which has left "only good memories [in Iran]".
"The repression of the Islamic regime has never allowed it to have relays on the spot, while the scattering of Iranian forces between the republicans and the monarchists, the left and the right, and those who represent the minorities, all divided on the future of the country and even on its past, did not help him", he deciphers.
And to conclude: "Despite the controversy, objectively, Reza Pahlavi remains the best known and most imposing figure within this motley opposition, no other Iranian personality or organization can bear comparison with him."
* The first name has been changed at the request of the person concerned.
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