The Lebanese are in a forced prison..No money for passports

Lebanon deprived its citizens of freely obtaining passports, following it stopped giving advance dates for obtaining a passport due to the economic crisis.

And the General Directorate of Public Security announced yesterday, Thursday, that it had suspended the work of a platform for advance reservations since Wednesday, due to the entry into force of the quantity of passports it owns, and the inability of the state to pay the value of the contract to the company contracting with it to secure passports, and thus the delay in obtaining passports sufficient for the volume of applications submitted.

The directorate indicated that “as of the year 2020, it has witnessed great pressure on passport applications, which exceeded tens of times in previous years, which affected its passport inventory.”

The General Security decision came despite the Parliament’s approval on April 7, 2022, of an exceptional appropriation of 300 billion (L.L) to cover the expenses of realizing one million Lebanese passports, but the Banque du Liban did not transfer the funds to the contracting company due to a dispute over the exchange rate that It must be approved.

The dispute occurred over the adoption of the official exchange rate (1500 LBP to the dollar) or the platform exchange rate (between 22 and 23 thousand LBP to the dollar). Despite the agreement to adopt the platform’s exchange rate, the Banque du Liban has not transferred the funds to the company to date, which prevented it from handing over new passports to General Security.

Subsequently, the Director-General of Public Security, Major General Abbas Ibrahim, explained in a television interview that “the passport registration platform has reservations until April 2023, following which the stock will run out until the required credits are opened.”

He stressed that the passports will be delivered to all those who registered until that date, and therefore the citizen who is booked following this date will not be able to obtain a passport until the required credits are opened for the French company that prints passports.

Ibrahim revealed that “the Banque du Liban refused to pay the company’s dues in dollars over the official price for its reasons, but we did not give up and went to the Parliament and informed the stakeholders to reach this point.”

He added: “We have an additional 300 billion lira reserved appropriation and it is stuck in the Ministry of Finance, and this procedure was necessary so as not to lose our credibility, and I hope that the statement will serve as a warning to obtain the required funds.”

Ibrahim admitted that there had been irregularities in passport dates, and said: “We have stood by the military, and some of them are imprisoned, and some of them will be referred to the Disciplinary Council.

He pointed out that “there are 20,000 passports in public security stores that their owners did not receive, and regarding 69 percent did not use the passports.”

He warned of many problems that the Lebanese will face if the credits are not approved, and the government must find a solution to this issue. He pointed out that “there are no new dates for passports until following the credit is opened.”

In addition, a person concerned with the file revealed to “Al-Ain Al-News” that the issue is now in the court of the Lebanese government to secure the credits, and there is no other solution in the directorate’s portfolio, because it cannot print the boards itself due to the required standards, and it originally does not have the funds, and is linked to a contract concluded with a company French”.

The sources stressed that there is no way to open the door to exceptions at the present time, because the number of passports has become seized, and any exception requires depriving another citizen of the right to obtain his passport.

As for the sources of the Ministry of Interior, they indicated that they will follow up the issue and the minister will raise the matter in the first session of the Council of Ministers to try to secure the funds as soon as possible.

The case prompted a great interaction on the media, and the former Director General of Public Security, MP Jamil, tweeted on his Twitter account: “For those who asked regarding the temporary solution, priority can be given to obtaining the passport for patients required to be treated abroad, for students registered to follow lessons or exams abroad. For those linked to work contracts abroad, for holders of foreign residency to renew its validity, for expatriates whose passports have expired, and other emergency cases.

As for the political writer Wissam Saadeh, he said: “With the Lebanese state stopping issuing new passports, the Lebanese have virtually all become refugees.

He added, “Therefore, you should issue them travel documents of the type specific to refugees, in accordance with the 1951 International Refugee Convention, and for that, official Lebanon must sign this treaty quickly following 71 years of not signing it, in order for travel documents to be issued to Lebanese refugees inside and outside Lebanon.”

At the end of February 2022, General Security had suddenly imposed conditions for obtaining passports that deprived many citizens of their right to obtain an official document that would enable them to travel and to prove their identity towards foreign bodies. This decision also reinforced clientelistic practices on the eve of the parliamentary elections.

Since 2019, Lebanon has been going through an economic crisis unprecedented in the country’s history and one of the worst crises in the history of the world since 1850, according to the World Bank.

The national currency lost more than 90% of its value and regarding 80% of the Lebanese people plunged into poverty.

The unprecedented economic collapse, insecurity and the deterioration of basic public services prompted a large number of families and young people to migrate.

A survey conducted by the “Arab Barometer” network in April showed that nearly half of the Lebanese aspire to emigrate.