SCC Calls for General Strike Wednesday as MPs Fail Again to Agree on Pay Raise

The Syndicate Coordination Committee called for a general strike on Wednesday after the joint parliamentary committees failed again to resolve the dispute on the Value Added Tax.

“Tomorrow, April 9, we will respond to joint parliamentary committees' negligence towards employees. Tomorrow is a day of revolution to free the state from squandering and from financial deals,” SCC head Hanna Gharib said at a press conference on Tuesday afternoon.

“Tomorrow we will eliminate the (draft law's) articles related to taxation and we will fund the new wage scale from banks and real estate's money, and from imposing fines on the violators of public properties,” Gharib added, noting that contractors and tenders will be given their rights similarly to state employees.

“The joint parliamentary committees insist on linking the new wage scale to revenues, and this is not supported by the constitution. The objective behind this is to keep stalling and avoid approving the law,” he commented.

He considered that Central Bank Governor Riad Salameh and the economic committees “are terrorizing the public over issuing the new wage scale.”

Salameh warned on Monday during a meeting with a delegation of some joint parliamentary committees' members of the dangers adopting the new wage scale would have on inflation, interests, and on the Global Credit Ratings.

Gharib called for a mass participation in Wednesday's strike, urging private schools, teachers, ministries' employees, and public administrators to join the march that will coincide with the MPs' session at the parliament.

The SCC head also warned of escalation in the protests, of an open-ended strike and of boycotting (the correction of) official exams.

Meanwhile, head of the private schools teachers association Nehme Mahfoud said issuing the new wage scale will spare the country a “social explosion.”

“Because the joint parliamentary committees did not resume studying the new wage scale, and because this matter has extended for over two and a half years, these officials should not stay in power,” he stated at the press conference.

Earlier in the day, Deputy Speaker Farid Makari, who chaired the meeting of the committees, said during a press conference in parliament that several articles of a proposal to fund the wage scale were approved.

But due to differences on other issues, including VAT, they agreed to continue their talks after a parliamentary session set to take place on Wednesday and Thursday, Makari said.

“I don't think there is any MP who rejects” the new wage scale, the lawmaker added.

A proposal has been made to raise VAT from 10 to 12 percent or increase it to 15 percent on certain luxury items. Several parliamentary blocs reject such a plan.

Makari tried to appease SCC protesters, telling reporters in parliament that the SCC “knows we are exerting efforts to resolve” the dispute on the wage scale.

S.D.B./G.K.

M.T.