Thursday, January 31, 2013

Politics in Iran vs politics in Canada!

Today, I read that Mr. Hassan Habibi a prominent leading politician has died in Iran due to heart and diabetic complications.
There is nothing striking about this fact except what I read in Persian and worth writing about.
The short column about his past summarizes that  he was the first Justice minster in Mr. Mehdi Bazargan government, later he became, vice president in Mr. Rafsanjani and Khatami givernment.
The part seemed interesting was this:

حبیبی، در برابر خواسته های مکرر برای گفت و گو و تاریخ نویسی درباره انقلاب که بارها توسط خواهر زاده اش «پروانه وحیدمنش» صورت گرفت، در نهایت گفته بود:‌« یا باید مثل هاشمی رفسنجانی خاطره نویسی کنم و جاهایی را یا حذف کنم یا غیر واقع جلوه دهم یا باید به طور رسمی بیایم و بگویم که ما اشتباه کردیم و به بیراهه رفتیم. من آدم هیچ کدامش نیستم دختر. نه این روزها می توانم بگویم اشتباه کردیم نه می توانم دروغ بنویسم. شاید روزی تاریخ ما را قضاوت کند.»

Mr. Habibi, in the face of repeated calls for expressing his historical views about the revolution by his nephew "Parvaneh vahidmanesh"he replied, "I should like Rafsanjani Memoir censor on many occasions what I have to say or write or just say things there were untruthful. Or I formally or actually come to state that we were wrong and we stepped on the wrong path. I'm not any of these type of people. I can say we did wrong and can't write lies. Maybe one day history will judge us. "

My own comment:
Interesting enough, that no politician in Iran can simply say, I made mistakes. I always wonder where did we learn this, in our family! Iranians learn to be stubborn. As expression goes, chicken has only one leg!  
We should never reveal anything that is internal (in our family circle). Everything on the surface should look perfect. We should never criticize our past, because they were great people and decision makers!
and try to show everything is fine in our inner circle!

compare that to the transparency that I see in Canada. 
Mr. Bob Rae, a liberal member of federal parliament in Canada, who has simply admitted he has smoked pot in the past.
Many come and allowed to criticize the past and learn from it.

I always wonder until we act like this in Iran (refraining from any criticism), can we become democratic in real sense?

maybe? may be not!