Morteza Shahmirzaei, who is also the CEO of
the National Petrochemical Company, said the country could nationalize its oil
industry in 1951 with so much efforts and sacrifices.
Congratulating Nowruz, he said: “It took many
years for the oil industry to be truly nationalized, and the oil industry
became truly national in 1979 with the victory of the Islamic Revolution and
the dismissal of foreign advisers."
From the time of the discovery of oil in Iran, foreign
powers used force and exploited the weakness of the Iranian state to coerce it
into concessions which allowed foreign companies to control oil extraction. The
nationalization of the oil industry was the response to these foreign
interventions.