Beirut (Al Ittihad, Agencies)
The Association of Public Administration Employees in Lebanon announced yesterday that employees will continue their open strike to demand the correction of their wages in the face of their inability to continue working after the collapse of the value of their salaries and the state’s inability to finance the wage increase. The head of the association, Nawal Nasr, stressed the inability of employees to reach their work centers due to the high costs of transportation, the rise in fuel prices, as well as the cost of living due to the collapse of the value of the local currency against the dollar, which led to the loss of wages 95% of its value.
Nasr explained that “everything that is offered by the government, including social assistance and transportation and attendance allowance, is for a period of two months, in addition to that it does not contribute to correcting wages as it should.”
For his part, the economic expert, Professor Jassim Ajaqa, said that there is a problem in providing the funding required for the wage correction process.
Ajaqa considered that the failure to solve this problem contributes to paralyzing the economic activity of the country, as many official transactions are suspended, and there are transactions related to goods in the port that are stuck in containers affected by the strike, in addition to stopping the collection of electricity and water and other procedures of a financial nature.
He pointed out that the World Bank had shown the decline of the Lebanese state’s incomes in 2021 to half of the incomes achieved in 2020, adding that this year is expected to record a greater decline compared to last year.
He said that all proposals for solutions have a problem in financing, and this can only be available through three sources, the first being the state treasury, the second obtaining external assistance, and the third financing through the Banque du Liban. In addition to the employees in the public administration, the employees of the ministries and their annexes in the governorates, totaling 15,000, participate in the open strike.
It is noteworthy that the official National News Agency, a few days ago, went on an open strike, similar to a number of parties in the public sector, announcing that their strike came due to the exacerbation of crises, which prevented harmonization between responsible job sense and the ability to reach the work position.