BEIRUT: Finance Minister Ali Hasan Khalil said Sunday night that the first step to addressing the current financial and economic situation is to pass the 2019 state budget, the state-run National News Agency reported.
“We are facing a test in the next six months. Either we [succeed] with fundamental decisions that fix our financial situation or we head towards deadlock,” Khalil said during a ceremony in Sidon’s Bablieh.
Khalil said that to start, a state budget that addresses the root cause of the economic situation must be passed quickly.
Parliament last week adopted a controversial spending measure that extended until the end of May the use of an emergency facility in the Constitution known as the “provisional 12th,” which according to the Constitution should allot a 12th of the previous year’s budget to cover the expenses for January alone.
MPs amended the law from its original form, extending the provision’s use till the end of May, and Speaker Nabih Berri gave the government one and a half months to endorse the 2019 budget, after which Parliament will have the same amount of time to ratify it.
The Daily Star / LEBANON
