Aoun commences national gathering: Lebanon’s salvation everybody’s responsibility

President Michel Aoun convened a national gathering on Wednesday at Baabda Palace in which he met with the heads of parliamentary blocs.

At the onset national gathering, he delivered the following address:

Esteemed audience,

Welcome to the Presidential Palace!

This meeting is not the first of its kind. I had called indeed for similar meetings when we faced major issues and challenges that required to be approached with national consensus.

And has Lebanon ever known other eras that needed this consensus more pressingly and badly than today?

The responsibility of the rescue that we are seeking does not befall one party, one political side, or one authority; because getting out of the dark tunnel that we are crossing is everybody’s responsibility.

I say so first because the great and dangerous weakness that has struck the economic, financial, monetary and social structure of our nation imposes on us the highest level of transparency and the greatest extent of union as well, under a lingering displacement crisis with no horizons, whose implications exacerbated at all levels; a new coronavirus that has further inhibited the arteries of our economy and our ailing growth; a harsh economic recession, a decrease in external demand and imports, and in the manufacturing and exports of materials and services, a severe shortage of tradable foreign currencies, a dreadful increase of unemployment and poverty rates, an uncontrolled rise in the prices of all sorts of commodities, a drop in the exchange rate of our national currency, a decrease in tax revenues and a decline of our social guarantees.

This complicated crisis is not spur-of-the-moment. It is rather the outcome of consecutive accumulations of wrong policies and practices that had preferred rent economy to productive, as we have warned in 48 public stances since I took office. These policies preferred quick profit over regular but permanent profit that comes from the sectors of production, services and knowledge. We must also add to the bad management of our public affairs other factors that have exacerbated our pathological condition, such as the changing environment around us, the effects of sporadic wars in our region, alongside our national crises entailed by our scattered consensual political decision at important intersections and milestones of our public life.

We are diagnosing the situation in order to draw lessons and treatments because what we need the most in these days is to overcome account settling and political bidding, and be united to overcome our exacerbating crisis and cover the loss incurred by all our public and private sectors.

Esteemed audience,

In a previous meeting held at the Presidential Palace on the 2nd of September 2019, we decided to declare the state of economic emergency and to put up a medium-term financial frame to address the problems of our public finance, accelerate the launching of the investment projects adopted in the context of the CEDRE conference, agree upon the McKinsey report and draw a road map to implement the sectorial recommendations featured therein.

And while we hoped that what we agreed upon then would contribute to preventing the outbreak of a severe crisis in the balance of payments, in the exchange rate of the Lebanese Pound (Lira) or in funding our public finance, thus stimulating production and vitalizing all economic sectors, the crises and setbacks unfolded one after the other since October 2019 after the banks stopped attending to the requests of their depositors in July 2019, and we entered into a highly volatile phase, which made it more pressing to find solutions.

This is what gave way to the financial recovery plan put up by the Government as per its prerogatives set out in article 65 of the Constitution. This rescue plan has been accompanied with an assistance request submitted to the International Monetary Fund - a mandatory path for recovery if we negotiate well and we are all fully committed to the reform course that is desired by our people - without any dictation, trusteeship or mandate, so we can put an end to the exhaustion of external reserves, protect the depositors’ funds, and try seriously and resolutely to contain the budget deficit and tackle the decline in the standard of living of the Lebanese citizens, especially the most vulnerable who were deprived of means to have a decent living.

In addition to the structural reforms that were partly sought by consecutive governments, the plan aims at correcting the structural imbalances in economy and finance, ensuring social safety nets and direct assistance to the most needy, and restoring confidence in our economic and financial system. It also aims at reducing public debt in a manner that shields Lebanon against future risks, placing public finance on a sustainable track, ensuring transparency through financial audit, unveiling and redressing cumulative losses at the Banque du Liban, and rehabilitating credits for productive sectors.

Furthermore, the plan aims at implementing reform measures to promote growth and increase productivity, in addition to correcting the balance of payments and improving the economy’s competitiveness, in parallel with a financial reform that focuses on uprooting corruption, improving tax compliance, controlling waste and managing well the public sector.

Throughout its phases, the plan intends to spare the most vulnerable class of our people the repercussions of the crisis, and to promote social safety nets, notably social security, health, education and other vital needs.

Therefore, aside from the required external financial support, the success of the plan and the acceptance of the needed sacrifices which, although hard, remain less severe than the fallout of a global economic and financial collapse, require national unity and deep awareness of what is threatening our existence, our being and the very identity of Lebanon.

Although the plan sets the goals, we still have to embark on immediate executive procedures that restore confidence in the State and the banking sector at both internal and external levels, and to adopt the necessary swift implementation steps.

Esteemed audience,

This plan was not studied with a political thinking but with an economic thinking.

I therefore call on you, political leaders who have a popular representation that has granted you access to Parliament, to approach the plan from this perspective, in the hope of being able to restore Lebanon’s role as an oasis of responsible and not brutal economic liberalism, under the rule of law and the logic of accountability, transparency, social justice, balanced development and sustainable reforms.

May we all succeed in our endeavors and union for the greater good of our country and our people.

Long Live Lebanon!