$5.9 billion Spending Bill to Land on Parliament Agenda Soon
Speaker Nabih Berri has promised to put a $5.9 billion 2011 spending bill on the agenda of a parliamentary session during an extraordinary round that lasts till March 19.
Ministerial sources told Beirut dailies on Tuesday that cabinet ministers deliberated the issue during a session held at Baabda palace a day earlier.
The ministers agreed that the only means available to pay the salaries of civil servants and cover other public expenses was to approve the bill, they said.
The spending based on the 2005 state budget was not enough to cover the costs.
If parliament approves the new bill, it would legalize spending by the government above 2005 levels. Lebanon hasn’t had any official budget since that year.
President Michel Suleiman signed a decree on Saturday for an extraordinary sitting of parliament till March 19 “to study all draft laws referred to it.”
Cabinet ministers agreed to discuss the bill during a session on Wednesday and pressure Berri into putting it on the agenda of a parliamentary session soon, the ministerial sources said.
The speaker has promised the ministers to settle the issue in the next 10 days, they added.
But it was not clear if the March 14-led opposition would vote in favor of the bill.
Parliament’s appropriations committee studied it last year and referred it to Berri. But during a legislative session in November, Al-Mustaqbal bloc leader Fouad Saniora and other opposition MPs rejected it under the pretext that they needed time to study it.
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