Bassil: Electricity Draft Law Must Be Approved Otherwise Govt. Would Be a Failure
Energy Minister Jebran Bassil criticized the failure to approve the electricity draft law, which he said will reflect negatively on the government because of its inability to resolve a matter that is as important as electricity.
He told As Safir newspaper in remarks published on Saturday: “What kind of message are we delivering to our opponents and the people? … I don’t think the country can persist like this.”
“The upcoming cabinet and parliamentary sessions will be decisive in settling this matter,” he stated.
“Let them study the draft law. Either we approve it as it has been prepared or the government will be toppled,” the minister stressed.
“We are making these statements out of our keenness on the government and the success of our allies,” Bassil added.
“We were not only concerned with overthrowing former Premier Saad Hariri, but we want to find solutions to problems that previous governments failed to reach,” he remarked.
Earlier this week, parliament failed to approve an electricity draft law proposed by FPM leader MP Michel Aoun that allows Bassil to receive $1,200,000,000 to implement a project on producing 700 Megawatts of electricity.
The March 14-led opposition says that the draft law gives the minister the freedom to use the amount of money without referring to the cabinet or without any monitoring by the Audit Bureau.
Meanwhile, Prime Minister Najib Miqati’s circles questioned the uproar over the draft law seeing as cabinet agreed to tackle the issue on Thursday, adding that some amendments may be introduced to it to ensure that funding in the project would take place according to the norms, reported the daily Al-Liwaa on Saturday.
According to Al-Liwaa on Friday, Miqati and Bassil quarreled over the draft law and its funding during cabinet’s session on Thursday.
Parliamentary sources told the daily that despite all of Bassil and Aoun’s outrage, it would be impossible to approve their financial demands because that would deepen Lebanon’s debt.
The solution to the electricity file lies in resorting to old methods, adopted by former Premier Fouad Saniora’s government, of deriving funds through loans and donations.
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