{"id":2420,"date":"2016-08-06T20:48:29","date_gmt":"2016-08-06T20:48:29","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2019-02-20T01:54:02","modified_gmt":"2019-02-19T23:54:02","slug":"lebanon-plans-first-budget-since-2005","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.jassemajaka.com\/?p=2420","title":{"rendered":"Lebanon plans first budget since 2005"},"content":{"rendered":"

Abdel-Rahman Ayas<\/span><\/p>\n

Lebanon\u2019s cabinet unanimously decided that it was \u201cnecessary\u201d to draft a state budget for the first time since 2005 but the fiscal plan may face delays as long-standing political divisions remain as hard to tackle as ever.\u00a0\u00a0The Council of Ministers\u2019 meeting discussed a report on the country\u2019s deteriorating fiscal situation presented by Finance Minister Ali Hassan Khalil. The country is burdened by $71 billion in public debt and an annual $4 billion budget deficit. Its gross domestic product is estimated at $44.35 billion and its annual growth at 1-1.5% in recent years.\u00a0\u201cThe ministers agreed unanimously that something should be done but they kept this\u2026 some\u00adthing for further discussions,\u201d a cabinet source said. \u201cKhalil\u2019s report is definitely worrying and all minis\u00adters seemed truly worried.\u00a0\u201cHowever, we all know that budgets were prepared almost eve\u00adry year since 2005 but were never passed due to conditions imposed by conflicting political parties.\u201d\u00a0In his 41-page report, Khalil warned of the repercussions of the worsening political crisis \u2014 namely the presidential vacuum \u2014 on the financial situation and the risks posed by random spending in the absence of a state budget. Uncon\u00adtrolled spending, which has drawn warnings from the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and others, wastes public funds and threatens disruptions in vital spending, the minister wrote.\u00a0Among other things, Khalil pro\u00adposed imposing taxes to increase revenues and avoid further deterio\u00adration of the struggling economy. He backed proposals to increase salaries of public sector employees and insisted that the budget should be finalised according to the con\u00adstitution \u2014 by the cabinet by Sep\u00adtember and by parliament by De\u00adcember. A source close to him said he would pressure the cabinet to is\u00adsue the budget in a special decree if parliament takes too much time to approve it.\u00a0An early sign to the thorniness of the matter came immediately after a July 12th cabinet meeting. Khalil has been locked in a war of words with former prime minister Fouad Siniora over alleged corruption and bribery at the Finance Ministry as well as mismanagement of public funds.\u00a0The Future Movement\u2019s parlia\u00admentary bloc, led by Siniora, criti\u00adcised the Finance Ministry for fail\u00ading to control spending and curb corruption and bribery. The bloc\u2019s statement drew a quick response from Khalil, a member of Speaker Nabih Berri\u2019s bloc, who rejected ac\u00adcusations of corruption and bribery at his ministry.\u00a0A key hurdle to passing state budgets since 2005 has been calls by critics of Siniora for a review of government expenditures since 1992. The critics, led by the Reform and Change bloc of Christian leader Michel Aoun, say Siniora was re\u00adsponsible for illegal spending, lead\u00ading to mushrooming public debt.\u00a0\u201cSince it reached parliament in 2005, the bloc hurdled the approval of budgets by imposing a precondi\u00adtion: auditing former budgets,\u201d the source said.\u00a0However, the bloc\u2019s leading party, the Free Patriotic Movement, hint\u00aded that compromise was possible. \u201cSome of Minister Khalil\u2019s propos\u00adals are feasible and can be subject to political consensus,\u201d said Foreign Minister Gebran Bassil, president of the movement and son-in-law of Aoun, its founder and honorary leader.\u00a0The Future Movement welcomed the cabinet\u2019s July 18th decision and urged for the election of a president by parliament and a revitalisation of all constitutional institutions. Lebanon has been without a presi\u00addent since May 2014 as political bickering has prevented parliament from reaching the necessary quo\u00adrum.\u00a0The parliament has twice extend\u00aded its tenure into a full 4-year term, expiring in 2017. The legislature is not meeting except randomly as many political parties stick to a constitutional article giving priority to the election of a president.\u00a0Economist Jassem Ajaka urged for a reformative budget. \u201cIt is dif\u00adficult to talk about temporary remedies. The fiscal situation has crossed the red line,\u201d he said. \u201cThe absence of budgets is responsible for many fiscal and financial ills, mainly the hike of public debts from $38 billion in 2005 to $71 bil\u00adlion now.\u201d.\u00a0If the request for auditing state fi\u00adnances between 1992 and 2005 was dropped or a compromise reached, another hurdle on the budget looms. Some ministers want Leba\u00adnon\u2019s contribution to an interna\u00adtional court looking into Rafik Hari\u00adri\u2019s 2005 assassination included in the budget, another cabinet source said.\u00a0The court is trying five leading Hezbollah members in absentia for planning and perpetrating the at\u00adtack killing Hariri and 21 others. Hezbollah ministers and lawmakers have hurdled Lebanon\u2019s settlement of its annual fees to the cabinet, forcing prime ministers to make the payment from a special fund under their disposal.\u00a0\u201cIt is unclear if the call for includ\u00ading the payment in the budget is se\u00adrious or just a manoeuvre to make callers for auditing government accounts since 1992 drop their call. Let us wait and see if a budget does get through,\u201d the second source said.<\/p>\n

Source The Arab Weekly<\/span>\u00a0<\/a>\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Abdel-Rahman Ayas Lebanon\u2019s cabinet unanimously decided that it was \u201cnecessary\u201d to draft a state budget for the first time since 2005 but the fiscal plan may face delays as long-standing political divisions remain as hard to tackle as ever.\u00a0\u00a0The Council of Ministers\u2019 meeting discussed a report on the country\u2019s deteriorating fiscal situation presented by Finance […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":2421,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[48],"tags":[937,214,101,196,370,100,136],"class_list":["post-2420","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-48","tag-abdel-rahman-ayas","tag-the-arab-weekly","tag-101","tag-publicdebt","tag-publicbudget","tag-100","tag-inthenews"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.jassemajaka.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/01\/8c33b7_61d14b3b7ed94737b4f4adf5e1a383a5~mv2.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paTyQg-D2","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jassemajaka.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2420","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jassemajaka.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jassemajaka.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jassemajaka.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jassemajaka.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2420"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.jassemajaka.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2420\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9455,"href":"https:\/\/www.jassemajaka.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2420\/revisions\/9455"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jassemajaka.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2421"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jassemajaka.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2420"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jassemajaka.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2420"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jassemajaka.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2420"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}