BEIRUT: Parliament looks set to meet in a legislative session next month to endorse urgent draft laws, including the public sector’s long-awaited salary scale bill.
“The atmosphere concerning the resumption of legislative sessions is positive,” Speaker Nabih Berri was quoted by visitors as saying Sunday. “But matters still need to be followed up through some contacts,”
Berri said he would call Parliament’s Secretariat General to meet to prepare the agenda of a legislative session, stressing that the salary scale bill would top the agenda.
He said he expected the issue of Parliament legislation to be tackled this week.
He added that he would meet former Prime Minister Fouad Siniora, the head of the parliamentary Future bloc, soon to hear from him details of the March 14 initiative to break the four-month-old presidential deadlock.
Berri predicted that the fate of Tuesday’s parliamentary session to elect a president would be the same as previous ones. “So far, no progress has been made in agreeing on the election of a new president,” he said.
There have been 11 sessions in the past four months that were aborted because of the lack of a quorum.
Earlier, Berri was quoted as saying that he would call for a legislative session once Prime Minister Tammam Salam returned from his visit to New York.
Salam leaves for New York Monday on a weeklong trip to attend the U.N. General Assembly sessions, during which he will deliver Lebanon’s speech at the General Assembly Wednesday.
In addition to the salary scale bill, other important items on the agenda include authorizing the issuance of Eurobonds to raise money for public financing, the rent law and a new electoral law.
Lebanese Forces MP George Adwan also spoke optimistically about the prospect of a session next month.
“Agreement has been reached to hold a legislative session in October to approve some essential draft laws that ensure the continuity of the work of institutions,” Adwan told a local TV station Sunday.
Adwan, who met Berri Saturday at Ain al-Tineh, said Parliament’s Secretariat General would convene next week to set the agenda for a parliamentary session.
Adwan said he and Berri had discussed efforts to amend items related to the parliamentary election deadlines in terms of the period in which the government should call for the poll and the creation of an election supervisory committee.
The presidential deadlock has paralyzed legislation in Parliament, which has been unable to meet over a lack of quorum even before former President Michel Sleiman’s six-year term ended on May 25.
March 14 lawmakers have refused to attend legislative sessions in the absence of a president, arguing that Parliament should only convene to discuss urgent matters.
Similarly, lawmakers from MP Michel Aoun’s bloc and Hezbollah’s bloc and its March 8 allies have boycotted parliamentary sessions to elect a president, demanding an agreement beforehand with their March 14 rivals on a consensus candidate.
Finance Minister Ali Hasan Khalil, from Berri’s bloc, sounded optimistic about ironing out differences between the March 8 and March 14 blocs over proposed taxes to fund the salary scale.
“I can say that the obstacles that had obstructed the finalization of the salary and rank scale in the past weeks are perhaps on their way to being resolved, on the basis of preserving the rights of citizens, employees and teachers by approving the salary and rank scale, which the state has been unable to resolve in the past years,” Khalil told a rally in the southern town of Blida.
Meanwhile, Maronite Patriarch Beshara Rai slammed rival politicians, saying their divisions and arrogance were to blame for the presidential stalemate.
“Domination, arrogance, political and sectarian divisions, allegiance [to foreign powers], dogmatism and attachment to personal interests have all led to a grave violation of the Constitution, which is the failure to elect a president six months ago,” Rai said during Sunday Mass in Bkirki.
He said the presidential deadlock had subsequently paralyzed constitutional institutions.
“Perhaps the members of Parliament do not realize that the president is the head of the state, which includes its land and people and its political, administrative, military and judicial institutions,” Rai said. “It is because of this comprehensive role that the [president] also becomes a symbol of national unity.”
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