THE LEBANESE PUBLIC DEBT AND THE GREEK DISASTER

THE LEBANESE PUBLIC DEBT AND ITS EVIL CONSEQUENCES

THE SEVENTY-FIVE BILLION DOLLARS QUESTION

May I be allowed to humbly point out that I discovered the power of shared information to transform the lives of the citizens and the governance of countries as early as March 2005 when I came back to Lebanon? Our NGO's motto was then "Inform before you Reform" to stress the value and the power of information in a democratic world.

Within a few months, my NGO completed the motto by adding: "and plan before you perform" to emphasize the absolute need for intelligent planning if a country was to succeed.

Open data is just the way to apply these basic and essential principles. I fully agree that it can revolutionize the nature of the relations among the citizens of a specific country, between the citizens and their leaders, and between several countries in a specific region.

 That is why I have kept calling for my ideas to be adopted in Lebanon in spite of a deadly campaign orchestrated against me and my NGO: "CPI The Lebanese Centre for Public Information", by the "powers at be" who had a "program “of their own, and for whom transparency and free information were anathema because they were bound to reveal their evil plan to “hijack" Lebanon.

 So far these "traitors" have succeeded in the first part of their PLAN.  Over the past ten years they managed to literally "grow" Lebanon's debt from $33 billion in 2005 to $75 billion today. At the same time they also successfully blocked, through their cronies in parliament and the Administration,  the implementation of any reforms in the country that were likely to prevent the realization of their evil scheme.

 None of the programs that were set up in the Agriculture, the Industry, the Environment, the Education, the Electricity, the Water, and the Tourism Plans were ever allowed to be executed because that was likely to put an end to their evil ambitions.

The growth of the Debt and the prevention of reforms were two faces of the same Machiavelli program. It consisted in bringing the country to its knees and then offering to rescue it by "privatization". In other words, lay their hands on the vital assets of the country: Electricity, Water, the Port, the Airport, and maybe the nascent oil and gas industry, in compensation for the redemption of a DEBT that they had, themselves, knowingly and “wittingly" contributed to build up.

 Oddly enough, it is almost, a “copie conforme” of what took place in neighbouring Greece, with the results that we are witnessing today.  So far, the story ends here. The real question remains: "Do we keep on executing that evil plot or do we stop, and "plan" for a better and socially fairer Lebanon?  THAT IS THE $75 BILLION QUESTION.

 WHY IS NOBODY INTEREST IN THE DEBT?

1. In 2006 we had the chance to repay the debt within thirteen years, by 2018. We did not need, had we promptly acted at the time, to mortgage any of our oil or gas revenue to do so. All we had to do, was to introduce and implement some essential reforms that should have included a 2% reduction in the rate of interest on the public bonds. That rate currently still stands at an average of 6.5%.

2. Now, nine years later, the conditions have changed. If we decide to start implementing the same reforms as from the first of January 2016, we shall need to wait  seventeen years, until 2032, to pay up our debt. But we shall need also to mortgage our future gas and oil revenue to the extent of one hundred billion dollars, starting from 2023 until 2032.

3. The more we procrastinate, the costlier and the longer it will take us to get rid of this damned Debt. 

4. Will somebody among our economists and our financial experts finally wake up to reality? I am really considering appealing to some foreign experts to drill some sense into their heads, before it gets too late for all of us. The Greek drama is not enough for us to teach us a lesson?