Iran's Ayatollah Khamenei is Filthy Rich
Baby, He's a Rich Man!
The Iranian government are some of the most hypercritical leaders in the world. They say one thing, but secretly do the opposite. It is really too bad the Iranian people lack the resolve and determination to topple the corrupt leaders.
Take the country's top dog, the Ayatollah Khamenei, a god-like figure to Iranians, primarily out of fear and the power he possesses. In history, Hitler comes to mind. Stalin comes to mind. He has the power, at his whim, to free or jail any Iranian, even the president of the country answers to him and has only so much independence.
Reuters news agency recently did a study of this diabolical leader determined to get the nuclear bomb. Despite his meager lifestyle, he controls the agency Setad, or "Setad Ejraiye Farmane Hazrate Emam" – Headquarters for Executing the Order of the Imam. Originally, the Setad was a real estate eminent domain business-seizing property by official decree but has now grown into a huge agency with control in every sector of Iranian industry, including finance, oil, telecommunications, the production of birth-control pills and even ostrich farming.
How much is the Ayatollah worth? Try, $95 billion dollars, mostly through the seizure of properties once belonging to ordinary Iranians for whatever reason. Setad has seized, just as Hitler did, thousands of properties once belonging to minority religions and frowned upon. They have seized property from the owner and then resold it for higher prices. Many of its companies generate billions of dollars in income for him, although, he lives in very basic accommodations
Originally, Setad was to only seize abandoned or derelict properties and resell them to give the money to charities in Iran, however, that mission morphed over the years where if the ayatollah instructs Sedat to seize and apartment building, it does and cannot be challenged. Any money made from it is not distributed to help the Iranian people but remains with Setad and ultimately, Khamenei.
The agency employs 500 people to run it. Iranian law forbids any oversight or accounting of Sedat. Its real estate division earns $52 billion a year from seizures and auctions. In one auction, there is sometimes 300 properties to buy! Sedat uses a methodical moneymaking scheme in which Setad obtains court orders under false pretenses to seize properties, and later pressures owners to buy them back or pay huge fees to recover them. The owner of the property is often portrayed as a bad person for not supporting the Ayatollah. When Setad seizes, the owners must evacuate immediately-just as the Jews did when Hitler seized property. Setad also holds auctions for many types of confiscated goods - including boats, motorcycles, flat-screen televisions, automobiles and even fertilizer.
Setad legally operates under Article 49, which allows it to seize nearly anything using a flimsy pretext. The sheer amount of money it has, controlled by one man, is power. This money is like a reserve, a private reserve, to be used to fund special projects like nuclear energy, weapons development. It is not part of the Iranian economy.
