Berri-Aoun Differences Linger over EDL Crisis
Efforts are ongoing to resolve the crisis that is threatening the March 8 alliance as AMAL movement leader Speaker Nabih Berri and Free Patriotic Movement leader MP Michel Aoun failed to agree on a solution concerning Electricite du Liban contract workers’ full-time employment.
According to As Safir newspaper published on Tuesday, Hizbullah and Marada leader Suleiman Franjieh are seeking to find consensus among the two parties.
The daily reported that a meeting held at Franjieh’s residence in Bnashii on Sunday between Aoun’s son-in-law Energy Minister Jebran Bassil, Hizbullah Liaison and Coordination Officer Wafiq Safa and former MP Youssef Saadeh, failed to bridge the sharp differences between AMAL and the FPM.
Sources said that the meeting didn’t reach a common ground, noting that Monday’s developments complicated the issue.
On Monday, the contract workers closed all the entrances of the company’s headquarters in Mar Mikhael with metal chains while the full-time employees staged a counter-protest outside.
The daily said that intensified contacts were held on Monday between Hizbullah and AMAL, however, Berri called on mediators to communicate with his advisor Health Minister Ali Hassan Khalil instead of him.
Sources told al-Akhbar newspaper that Berri is waiting for the concerned parties to go back to the parliament “where he will be open to any proposed modifications to the draft law.”
The sources linked the looming crisis with the stances of Bassil who “refuses any solution other than the one he has in mind.”
“We will not allow anyone to target us anymore,” sources close to Berri told the daily.
Head of General Labor Confederation Ghassan Ghosn told An Nahar newspaper that Berri withdrew from the negotiations regarding the issue.
The ties between Berri and Aoun deteriorated after the parliament approved a decision taken by the joint parliamentary committees to permanently employee the workers instead of adopting Bassil’s proposed plan, arguing that 80 percent of them belong to non-Christian sects and most of them support Berri, who is a Shiite.
Bassil had previously proposed to allow 700 contract workers to stand for an official exam, out of some 2,500 employees, while the rest would become employees at private companies under a three-month probation period as EDL can’t contain all of the employees.
The contract workers have been holding a strike for the past three months demanding EDL to pay them their June-July salaries and their full-time employment.
over 11 years
...and still there are people cheyfin micho w'mich msad2in. saint micho el eddiss...what an unfortunate burden this man is on all Lebanese, the ones for him and the ones against him.
over 11 years
eh eh khalikon chimtanin finna...w'ba3dein? everything that goes up has to eventually go down. Simple laws of physics and then we will sort out the sweet apples from the bitter oranges.
over 11 years
Who stoped the project in 2006 idiot!?
over 11 years
2 gay guys sorting out who is going on top..
over 11 years
castro, ma fi lzoum ninzal la mistawehon...we are better than them, let's act like it and no I didn't give you a thumbs up or down, I am just talking to you one brother to another.
over 11 years
lol
over 11 years
Mademo basil wazir la7 betdalla ma7ro2a sarbadda lanbah tegyir tatnawwerna bshro2a
over 11 years
They have no money to pay employees since the spring and Berri decided to recruit another 5000 of them?
over 11 years
relax with bandoul. He's a good guy and he honours us with his presence here... can't say the same about everyone :p
I know you're pro FPM, but your Bassil is worthless... c'est un parvenu incapable de travailler ni de s'adapter a son environement.
over 11 years
@benzona, thanks for the kind words. C'est gentil! Je préfère ne pas discuter avec des gens qui se portent comme des salles bêtes mais malgré moi je me trouve obligée. A la fin, la seule chose qui m'intéresse est l'avenir du Liban. Please forgive all typos/grammar...it's been a while since I typed in French.
over 11 years
Eh bien Bandoul, ton français est excellent. T'as des beaux restes. Je pense que tout le monde se préoccupe de l'avenir du Liban MAIS PAS DES LIBANAIS. En ce qui me concerne, je suis pessimiste et résigné. Mais quoi qu'il en soit, une chose est certaine, il ne faut pas retomber dans la spirale des armes que certains partis du 8 Mars encouragent subrepticement!
Salutations.
over 11 years
@benzona and @bandoul
You guys should just get a room...
over 11 years
I call for the privatization of EDL. Let it compete in a regulated market. This will force it to become effective and competitive. There will be absolutely no room for featherbedding nor sectarian quotas in the company. Many countries in Europe have taken this approach with great success. The US did this a long time ago. Yes, this will put people out of work but the consumer will benefit. The people who lose their jobs should be compensated by the government as an interim procedure. In a country that us riddled with cronyism and corruption, state ownership of such assets must be kept to a minimum.
over 11 years
Sorry, but nobody is interrested when you cannot collect 30% of the electricity produced and get shot at when you try to... and when a militia forbidds you to invoice 15 to 20% of the production...
Who will be interrested in THAT business???
over 11 years
Well if you can't collect 30% of the power produced, then don't send it where you can't collect. As a privately-owned company you can do that. Let Hezbollah produce its own electricity and subsidize its people.
over 11 years
Well FT competition implies that EDLs monopoly will end and other companies would offer electricity to the customers and customers will have the power to chose. EDL would still own the infrastructure (the power lines and transformers and so forth) but would be forced by law to allow access to other companies (to transport other companies electricity for a regulated fee). It is nothing revolutionary, really. The Europeans have done this for a long time. Even European countries with very strong socialist tendencies have adopted this approach both for Electricity and Telecom. And if Berri buys it, it will have to compete with nibbler, more entrepreneurial companies. Even Berri will be forced to adjust ;-)
over 11 years
Jabal, it is more complicated than that and you know it... They bypass it and steal it...
over 11 years
My argument is of course useless unless the market is opened to other players. This is prerequisite nr 1.
And by the way micho, thank you for giving us the worst summer in Lebanon's history. A summer in the dark!!!