"تقارير إدارية ١٩٢٠-١٩٢٤" [و‎‎١‎٤‎٥] (٤١٢/٢٩٤)

PERSIAN gulf political residency, 1923. 4l
The Eais Nazmieh receives Tumans but 80 per mensem and the post has
been the perquisite of the army, . 1
property Nalb ' EalS ^ 1:llmSelf been P rosec »ted for being in possession of stolen
His Majesty's Consul has personally had much to Complain of and even
when he himself discovered the thief of a diamond ring and other things in his
in the (Consulate WaS 6 as tlle thief was I" 146 evidently the Police spy
Local Politics.
Local politics for the year may be summed up in the word " The Elections
\vorW e hlf^ e tn 0 t»t^™ b8r K.^ 116 ^ 88 is S r eat and the families and parties
worked hard to get their candidates elected till it resulted in such an amount
ot intrigue bribery and corruption that in the end the members of the parties
ihemselves were m doubt who they were supporting or who would support
them. changed from side to side as the pavments dictated until except
the candidates themselves and their friends, it was impossible to state^efi-
•utely who was at the moment, on which side. The Mullas reaped a harvest bv
Z^T S 0 18 ^ 02511 teleSram wMch the sent to fhe authorities m
The Governor-General's tenure of office became involved in the partv
t 8 e ^i S , 0 ^ tainecl 1 ? 1S support, the other side beseiged the
tcjej! aph office with complamts against him, while his own intrigues alienated
irst one party and then the other and sometimes both ; the last being owin«'
v ge i 11S fl OT ™ jpdidates elected, a desire h; found to be unreal"z°
able as it combined both parties against him.
.'f 0 g iv e a t de t taiI ® d despriptjon of the fight would take up too much space
hut it may be stated that after two suspensions from Tehran, with the Governor-
(xcneral s support and by meaps of intimidation by agents and Deputy Governon
which staggered even the Persian the following Democrats were elected :
For Kerman City—
Asaf-ul-Mamalik of the Ibrahimi family.
Mulla Farajullah.
For Rafsinjan—
Mirza Shahab, ^a Sheikhi and a member of the Socialist party. As
a Sheikhi he belongs to the same sect as the Ibrahimi family.
The elections for Bam were conducted with great heat. The Governor-
Genera^ showed a tendency to back the Bolshevist friend Agha Mehdi until
His Majesty's Consul protested to him privately against his supporting a man
who had shewn such open anti-Btitish tendencies. Thereupon he changed
his support to the Wakili family Amir Ihtisham, a clever opportunist to whom
the IbraMmi family had no objection. The extreme democrats however
objected to the Governor-General using the same methods at Bam, Sirjan and
Jiruft as had resulted in the election of their candidates in Kerman and Rafsinjan
and with the powerful support of Sulaiman Mirza the Socialist deputy and
member of the new Cabinet they were able to get the elections suspended per
manently just as the election boxes with votes for Amir Ihtisham had been
collected.
An inspector was to be appointed from Tehran who has not yet arrived
and in this condition the election still remains.
Bam is democratic to a degree which may be called Bolshevistic and it is
to be feared that Nazim-ut-Tujjar who was arrested and deported by General
Sykes and is now in Tehran will be elected.
At Sirjan the conditions were much the same beyond that before the sus
pension votes had not been taken. An inspector was appointed in the person
of the new Karguzar Moazid-i-Azam but on the complaint of the democrats
his appointment was cancelled. The falling cabinet of Mushir-ed-Dauleh was
evidently afraid of the Democrats and though refusing to listen to the
Moderates' complaints gave way at all times to the requests of the local
democrats.
These elections are now being completed and it is anticipated that a new
candidate Ata-ul-Mulk stated to be the nominee of the Sirdar Sipeh will be
elected.
U61FD