BEIRUT: Lebanon’s government finally appointed a new board of directors on Tuesday to control the state-owned electricity company.
Electricite du Liban (EDL) has long been mired in allegations of corruption and fraud. Its annual losses of up to $2 billion a year are the biggest single drain on state finances as Lebanon faces economic collapse and the plunging value of its currency.
Reform of the electricity sector has been a key demand of the International Monetary Fund and potential donor states before they will consider a financial bailout.
“Lebanon’s electricity policy has been inefficient and ineffective for decades — always on the brink of collapse, but staying afloat with last minute patchwork solutions,” said Kareem Chehayeb of the Tahrir Institute for Middle East Policy in Washington, DC.
“The economic crisis has made fuel imports more expensive, causing a shortage, with external generator providers hiking their prices or seeking business in Syria. It is a wake-up call to decades of overspending and poor planning of a basic public service.”
The World Bank has described the electricity sector in Lebanon as “tainted with corruption and waste,” and the IMF said “canceling the subsidy to electricity is the most important potential saving in spending.”
Electricity rationing was applied for the first time to hospitals and the law courts, but Minister of Energy Raymond Ghajar said: “The first vessel loaded with diesel for power plants has arrived, and as of Wednesday the power supply will improve.”
Prime Minister Hassan Diab promised the Lebanese people on Tuesday that they would see the results of government efforts to resolve the country’s financial chaos “in the coming weeks.”
Addressing a Cabinet meeting, Diab said: “The glimmer of hope is growing.” However, the appointment of an EDF board of directors was criticized by opposition politicians. Former prime minister Najib Mikati said the appointments meant “the crime of wrong prevailing over right … is being repeated.”
New board of directors appointed to run Lebanon’s ‘corrupt’ state power company
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New board of directors appointed to run Lebanon’s ‘corrupt’ state power company
- Regulation of electricity sector a key condition of international bailout for collapsing economy
Israel strikes Islamist group’s HQ in Sidon, south Lebanon: state media
- “The Israeli enemy carried out an air raid a short while ago, targeting a headquarters of the Jamaa Islamiya,” state media said
- The strike almost entirely destroyed a seven-story building
BEIRUT: Israel struck a headquarters belonging to the Islamist group Jamaa Islamiya, an ally of Hamas and Hezbollah, in the southern Lebanese city of Sidon on Tuesday, state media reported.
“The Israeli enemy carried out an air raid a short while ago, targeting a headquarters of the Jamaa Islamiya” in the coastal city, state media said.
Sidon was largely spared of major Israeli attacks during the last war between Israel and Hezbollah, which a November 2024 ceasefire sought to end.
The strike almost entirely destroyed a seven-story building, according to an AFP photographer, and ambulances rushed to the scene.
It caused a powerful blast in a densely populated area, as seen on local media.
The Israeli military then issued an evacuation warning for another building in Sidon, saying it will hit “Hezbollah military infrastructure... in light of its prohibited attempts to rebuild its activities in the area.”
The Jamaa Islamiya had previously been the target of Israeli strikes in Lebanon after claiming responsibility for rocket launches toward Israel during the war between Israel and Hezbollah that began in October 2023.
Last month, it accused Israel of seizing one of its officials from a town near the border.
The Israeli military said that it “apprehended a senior terrorist” in the group who was then “transferred for further questioning in Israeli territory.”
