Parliament abuzz as MPs return to work

BEIRUT: The Parliament was busy Monday as Lebanese leaders swung into full action after the holiday break, with lawmakers and ministers meeting to continue their work on several matters.

Under the food safety campaign launched by Health Minister Wael Abu Faour late last year, the subcommittee tasked with drafting a food safety law convened to conduct a final reading.

Along with subcommittee head MP Atef Majdalani, Abu Faour, Economy Minister Alain Hakim, Tourism Minister Michel Pharaon and Industry Minister Hussein Hajj Hasan were in attendance.

Officials used the opportunity to comment on the draft law before it was referred to the Parliament’s Joint Committees, which study draft laws before submitting them to Parliament for a vote.

The Parliament’s Administration and Justice Committee, headed by MP Robert Ghanem, also convened to continue discussing the new rent law following the Constitutional Council’s decision to annul a number of its articles last summer.

The council had disputed several articles that stipulated a committee should be formed to determine the amount of rent increases.

The new rent law, endorsed by the Parliament in April, went into effect last month and is said to affect around 200,000 apartments, many of which are in Beirut.

Separately, a joint news conference was held at the Parliament by MPs Joseph Maalouf, Yassin Jaber, Mohammad Qabbani and Farid Khazen, who have been tasked by Speaker Nabih Berri to follow up on laws passed by Parliament that were never implemented.

This occurs when ministers do not sign decrees that have otherwise been approved. From 2000-2014, some 32 laws have befallen this fate.

Criticizing this state of affairs, Jaber said some ministers had become stronger than Parliament, particularly in the wake of the presidential vacuum, while MP Marwan Hamade accused some of flat-out ignoring a number of laws passed.

With regard to the thorny issue of a new electoral law, the subcommittee of the Administration and Justice Committee also met Monday.

Subcommittee head MP Nawar Sahili said in a statement that it had “met with members of the committee that supervised the previous elections and discussed with them the committee’s role, the realities and gaps it faced, and how to solve them.”