BEIRUT: Efforts are underway to convene a parliamentary session as part of a controversial deal by which lawmakers would extend the legislature’s mandate and approve the public sector’s salary scale bill, parliamentary sources said Friday.
Finance Minister Ali Hasan Khalil, from Speaker Nabih Berri’s bloc, said the endorsement of the wage hike bill was crucial for holding any parliamentary session.
“Despite the political and security pressures we are facing these days, we still insist on the approval of the salary scale bill,” Khalil said, speaking in the southern Beirut suburb of Shiyah.
“We are still committed to this matter and view it as essential for holding any parliamentary session,” he added.
Parliamentary sources in the March 8 and March 14 blocs said a session to extend Parliament’s term for between three months and one year had almost been secured.
But setting a date for such a session is linked to the outcome of ongoing negotiations between Berri and the March 14 movement, namely the Future bloc and its head, former Prime Minister Fouad Siniora, to agree on items to be discussed by the Parliament’s general assembly, the sources said.
They added that the March 8 and March 14 blocs were currently holding consultations to determine if it was possible to agree on how to finance the salary increases for public sector employees, while ensuring that the approval of the bill would not harm Lebanon’s economy or its public finances.
Sources said the March 8 bloc no longer opposed raising the Value Added Tax by 1 percent, as demanded by the Future Movement to generate funds for the higher salary scale.
Other items put on the agenda include authorizing the issuance of Eurobonds to raise money for public financing and the issue of extra-budgetary spending.
It was not immediately known whether the long-simmering dispute over whether to retroactively authorize the government’s extra-budgetary spending from 2006 to 2013 would be part of the deal.
There are many indications pointing to the extension of Parliament’s mandate, which expires on Nov. 20, the same sources said.
One such indication, the sources said, is the fact that the Future bloc, the largest bloc in Parliament, has rejected the idea of holding parliamentary elections before the presidential vote.
Furthermore, it is now thought that that Berri would not challenge the extension of Parliament’s mandate, if it were put forward.
According to the sources, the legislative session would not need a two-thirds majority of the legislature’s 128 members, because it would be a session to continue discussion of the salary scale draft law, which is a top priority on the general assembly’s agenda.
Similarly, any session held to extend Parliament’s term would not require a two-thirds majority, and the extension can be passed with a majority of half of the lawmakers who secure a quorum plus one, the sources said.
According to the mechanism that would be followed during the proposed legislative session, once the Parliament’s lawmakers have finished debating draft laws on the agenda, Zahle MP Nicolas Fattoush would ask Berri to present to the general assembly the urgent draft proposal he submitted, which calls for the renewal of Parliament’s term, the sources added.
Berri, according to Parliament’s bylaws, would present the draft proposal to the general assembly for debate and approval, with the possibility of amending the extension period proposed by Fattoush.
Fattoush last month presented a draft proposal to Parliament’s Secretariat General for the extension of the legislative body’s mandate for two years and seven months, arguing that the move was aimed at protecting civil peace.
During a legislative session in May last year, Parliament approved the extension of Parliament’s term by 17 months.
Berri has called for a new parliamentary session next Tuesday in order to pick a successor to former President Michel Sleiman, but it is widely thought that the move is doomed to fail. There have been 11 sessions in the past four months that were aborted because of the lack of a quorum.
Meanwhile, U.N. Special Coordinator for Lebanon Derek Plumbly met Prime Minister Tammam Salam, with whom he discussed the security situation in Lebanon and developments in the region.
“We discussed the preparations for the ministerial meeting of the International Support Group for Lebanon that will take place next week in New York at the invitation of U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon,” Plumbly said in a statement after meeting with Salam at the Grand Serail.
He added that the objectives of the meeting in New York were to express political support for Lebanon and to highlight the need to speed up the delivery of material assistance to the Lebanese Army, “as well as the needs of the Syrian refugees and host communities and of the government to address economic and other costs arising from the tragic war in Syria.”
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