Memoirs of Akbar Hashemi – May 24, 1999

We left home for the Tehran International Exhibition Center to attend the opening of the specialized electricity industry exhibition. I visited dozens of booths. Progress in the electricity industry during the Reconstruction Era has been considerable, and the foreign-currency component of costs has declined significantly. In 1990, nearly $1.3 million was required to generate each megawatt of electricity; now the figure is less than $400,000. Industry representatives generally acknowledged that they owed much to the policies pursued during the Reconstruction Era. In the auditorium, following welcoming remarks and reports by Mr. [Mohammad] Maleki, Deputy Minister of Energy, and Engineer [Habibollah] Beytaraf, Minister of Energy, I spoke about the importance of the electricity sector and its progress.

I went to my office and worked until the evening. In the afternoon, I gave an interview lasting more than two hours to Channel One of the national television network about the outstanding aspects of Imam Khomeini’s leadership. The interviewer was Dr. Mohammad Javad Larijani. Unlike other interviewers, he did a great deal of talking himself, but the interview went well.

In the evening, Mehdi, [managing director of the Marine Industries Engineering and Construction Company], came and reported on the company’s activities and the opening of new workshops in Khorramshahr. He said that part of the company’s profits would be allocated to building a memorial for the martyrs at Shalamcheh.