AND, NOW WHAT?

AND, NOW WHAT?

26/07/2015

Merci Giselle pour partager mon enthousiasme. La participation citoyenne à la gouvernance est mon dada favori depuis 1956 quand je l'avais mise en application dans une mine de cuivre, d'argent et d'or au Kenya. J'avais ainsi réussi à éviter la fermeture de la mine quand les prix mondiaux du cuivre avaient chuté. Quarante-cinq ans plus tard, un projet de construction de 4,000 maisons a bat cout en République Dominicaine ($11,500 par maison pour loger 10 personnes) chuta avec l’évènement du 9/11 à New York. Même tentative au Nigeria ou le Président Jimmy Carter m'avait encouragé à poursuivre un projet similaire  qui fut dérouté à la dernière minute par la convoitise et la corruption légendaire des responsables nigériens. A présent, Giselle, je vois un peu plus grand. C'est tout un pays qu'il faut sauver de la faillite et c'est à toute une population que je demande de le faire, en faisant fi des divisions et des intérêts mesquins. Vais-je aussi échouer là ou vais-je enfin réussir à la 24 Emme heure? Certains hauts responsables me conseillent de tenir bon, sans parler que je suis convaincu, jusqu'au plus profond de mes os, que nous allons droit vers la faillite si nous persévérons dans cette attitude idiote. Priez pour moi. Non, priez pour le Liban

NO MR.  AKKAOUI, please don't tell me that you have also fallen under the same trap, again: Finance, Finance, Finance..... Decidedly, you have the same bee in the same bonnet. Our problem originated with finance, and you want to cure it with the same ill? Our problem, Mr. Akkawi, can only be cured by fighting the cancer not feeding it.  REFORMS, REFORMS, REFORMS are the "mot d'ordre" Mr.Akkawi. Cut down the interest rate on the debt by two per cent. Mr. Akkawi and you save Lebanon $109 billions over the next seventeen years. REFORM EDL and you save $2.00 billions a year. Collect the 6% real estate registration fees adequately and scrap the law that allows Limited companies to skirt the fees and you save $1.7 billion dollars a year. Finally tell our politicians to make up their damn mind and start the gas & oil exploration and devote the first ninety billions toward repaying the debt, and you will end up debt free by 2031.Come on Yasser, stop groping in the dark and face reality for God's sake! ! Had you promoted this program in 2006, when I first proposed it to you, at the time, we would have been debt free by now. Instead we may reach that end in 2031, if all goes well. InshÁllah!

Mr. Photiades, kindly read my comments below to Mr. Akkawi and tell me where I am wrong. we can repay our Debt, but it will take us 17 years. The economy of Lebanon, Mr. Photiades has been strangled by the financiers ever since 1993 when they started "growing" that evil Debt from $7 billions needed for the post-civil war reconstruction to the $72 billions it stands at today. We have to go back to a more "logical"economy": Agriculture, industry, and innovations. We have a "surplus" work force (the 2.5 million refugees: both the Syrians and the Palestinians"). They are a "boon" not an evil. Why not use them to boost our agriculture and our industry and find intelligent ways to export them, in spite of the obstacles? We can do it Mr. Photiades, if we really WANT IT. But it is the will that we lack coupled with that obsession on "FINANCE" that has ruined us so far and that Christine Lagarde, herself, is BEMOANING in a previous article. Greece and Lebanon are sharing the same fate, and they can both be cured by the same remedies, Believe me, when I say it.

“NICOLAS PHOTIADES I AGREE WITH YOU WHOLEHEARTEDLY MR. SABAT.

IT IS THE DEBT HELD BY THE BANK THAT MADE THEM LAZY AND UNWILLING TO DEVELOP INTO MORE PRODUCTIVE ACTIVITIES. IT SERVED A PURPOSE BACK IN THE EARLY NINETIES, BUT NOW WHAT IS NEEDED IS WHAT YOU SAY.”

To these ego boosting comments, from such knowledgeable and experienced experts,  as Mr. Photiades and Mr. Yasser Akkawi, I am brought to reply as follows:

Message to  Mr.Y. Akkawi, Editor-in-Chief –  “ Executive Magazine”

After years of wars and destruction in the Middle East, what is most needed, at this time, when the US/Iranian reconciliation is looming at the horizon?  My answer is in three words: HOUSES, FOOD, AND EDUCATION.

What are we waiting for in Lebanon to start supplying these “commodities” to the countries that need them most? Do you get my meaning, Yasser? This is the direction that we must follow, as from today, and without wasting one minute.

Let us BUILD, FEED, AND EDUCATE, but first let us REFORM AT HOME, I beg you. 

But, we can only reform together, March 8 and 14, hand in hand and not one against the other. So, for God’s sake, let us grow up, forget our trivial differences, and start “REBUILDING BOTH LEBANON AND THE REGION.”