Rajavi and his catalysts have misused the history of the organization and its founders in order to justify members that early founders of MKO, and Mohammad Hanifnejad in particular, have appointed Rajavi as the next leader of the organization. In this regard, a number of Rajavi’s fellows have fabricated some statements and have attributed them to Hanifnejad in order to legitimize the ideological leadership of Rajavi. Following the previous articles on the statements made by Lotfollah Meisami and others, here we take a look at those made by Mehdi Abrishamchi and one of the MKO former members. Abrishamchi summarizes all we mean by his manipulation of the history of the organization in one sentence, sacrificing all the alive and dead of the organization to Rajavi and says:
When Masoud speaks, it seems as if he speaks as the representative of all the alive and dead of the organization. 1
He further shows the spirit of Hanifnejad full of praise for Rajavi and makes an attempt to raise the status of Masoud, stating:
Evidently, no one but Masoud is aware of his own status, and hardly anybody can grasp that Masoud has arrived at the high summits of our ideals and has developed our revolution, ideas, and organization to a point that would for sure elevate the soul of Hanifnejad to appreciate. 2
Although the organizational principles of MKO are opposed to centering on just one individual, he introduces Rajavi as the history of the organization and says:
Our greetings and songs, cries and slogans, love and affection, will and determination, poems and stories, all aim to imply the fact that if Mojahedin have reached the present position and have developed their revolution up to this point, serving the humanity and achieving many honors, they owe all these to the ideological leadership of Masoud. Also, we owe our recent ideological revolution to Masoud and Maryam. 3
Manipulating the history of the organization and its victims in Rajavi’s favor is so disgraceful and repulsive that Anne Singleton, an MKO former member, refers to Rajavi as misusing the members’ ignorance, writing:
Rajavi is very good at spending from other people’s pockets, especially in using the deaths of his followers. 4
She further expounds on the fact that Rajavi consents to subordinate all the historical achievements of the organization obtained as a result of so much blood shed for achieving his personal ambitions:
Rajavi clearly wanted power and was prepared to subordinate the whole organisation and all its members into a means for him to achieve this. 5
Interestingly, Rajavi and his fellows claim that he is inheritor of all the ideological principles and the history of the organization. However, the fact is that the ideological principles of the organization have been manipulated, distorted, held in archive and even eliminated under the command of Rajavi and in his favor whenever necessary:
It is worth mentioning Rajavi’s other motive for removing and then burning all of the books from the camp libraries and safe houses abroad, (libraries which incidentally only had approved books in them anyway), and that is that these books and documents were in contradiction to having an ideological leader. Even his own speeches in Tehran University in the political phase before 30th Khordad were destroyed. These speeches had been published and avidly read at the time. Their essence was taken from Marx and Mao and was to compare the evolution of species with the evolution of society and, of course, Islamicise it. Another reason was that these books and documents were very much in contradiction with capitalism and harmful to Rajavi’s new approach to his new Western masters. Until now, the whole ideology and activities of the Mojahedin, including the killing of Americans, all their songs etc, had been built on Maoism and the fight against the West and imperialism. 6
She further elaborates on perverting the ideology of the organization by Rajavi for instrumentalizing the ideology:
Rajavi perverted the ideology of the Mojahedin from its original conception to something, which allowed him total control of all aspects of the organisation including the personal lives of the members. Alongside this internal change, the organisation also lost its direction in the political scene. 7
It has to be pointed out that the history of the organization, its founders and its ideological principles, are of no significance for Rajavi. Their value depends on the extent to which Rajavi can abuse them for the achievement of his ambitions and stabilization of his cultic leadership in the organization. He has attempted to fabricate some memories and accounts to present himself and pretend to be the sole inheritor of the organization and its principles to which he is not hew. He has exploited all the resources of the organization for the fulfillment of his personal interests at the hands of a number of his ignorant fellows.
References:
1. The lecture of Mehdi Abrishamchi on the ideological revolution, Mojahed journal, no. 255
2. ibid
3. ibid
4. Singleton, Anne, Saddam’s private army.
5. ibid
6. ibid
7. ibid