Change and Reform Rejects Finding Comprehensive Settlement to Controversial Spending

MP Ibrahim Kanaan, who is a member of MP Michel Aoun’s Change and Reform bloc, rejected the formation of a parliamentary committee tasked with studying spending made by the current and previous governments to find a comprehensive settlement to the issue.

In remarks to An Nahar daily published Friday, Kanaan said: “The idea of the (formation of) the committee was proposed by (Speaker Nabih) Berri on the eve of the (legislative) session given that the $5.9 billion spending bill and other draft laws on the agenda would be adopted.”

But the formation of the committee is out of the question for the Change and Reform bloc before the March 5 session, the lawmaker stressed.

The parliamentary session on Thursday was adjourned to March 5 after March 14 opposition MPs stormed out of the legislature to protest the bill that would legalize extra-budgetary spending by Premier Najib Miqati’s government.

The opposition has conditioned its approval of the bill to a settlement of the $11 billion spent by the governments of ex-Premiers Fouad Saniora and Saad Hariri between 2006 and 2009.

Kanaan reiterated the rejection of his bloc to link the two issues.

Lebanon has been without a state budget since 2005.