A few days ago, the General Directorate of Public Security discovered military involvement in facilitating citizens’ obtaining passports in exchange for sums of money of up to $500. After his “exposure”, the soldier disappeared from view, and was subsequently arrested.
It is not the first time that the Directorate has seized a line of complicity between civilian brokers and military personnel who facilitate the obtaining of passports for its applicants, stopping them and then referring them to the Disciplinary Council. However, this manipulation and fraud continued even after the Director General of Public Security, Major General Abbas Ibrahim, issued a decision to refer all requests to change appointments on the platform to the office of the Director General for personal viewing and verification.
In this context, Major General Abbas Ibrahim confirms to “ASAS” that he took a decision to prosecute the briber and the briber together in an attempt to curb fraud attempts to obtain a passport in exchange for sums of money.
It is an emerging and unfamiliar reality in the process of obtaining the self-evident right of the Lebanese to possess or renew a passport. A reality imposed by the shortage of passports, which still exists until further notice, and among its illogical translations is the time span between the date of submitting the application on the platform and determining the date of conducting transactions, which has become more than a year old.
However, urgent requests to obtain passports are still possible through the office of the Director General, where a request is made to submit an appointment for obtaining the passport on the platform, and after verifying the reasons for delivering it within a short period of time, the appointment is submitted.
And in a continuous reflection of the crisis, the General Security Directorate has finally begun to hand over passports of the old version of the 2003 model, which the directorate has stopped using since 2016, which raised a “leap” among the Lebanese about their suitability to international conditions and the possibility of not being accepted at airports around the world.
Ibrahim told ASAS that “the directorate resorted to this procedure some time ago due to its depletion of its biometric passport stock, as only a few of them remained that did not meet the demand for them.”
150 thousand .. in October
The Director General confirms that “the first batch of biometric passports arrives in early November, and they number 150,000 biometric passports out of 400,000 passports that were supposed to constitute the first batch.”
After the Directorate passed the internal obstacles in terms of monitoring the required funds, it was found, according to Ibrahim, that there is an external problem in Europe that delays the delivery of passports within these same countries, which, of course, was reflected in a delay in delivering the agreed quantities to the countries requesting them.
Settling any controversy, Ibrahim asserts that “passports version 2003, which are granted for a maximum of five years, are recognized at the international level by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), and therefore there is no problem in their adoption in airports around the world. Of course, it was not possible to distribute them again to the Lebanese before obtaining international approval,” otherwise it would be a disaster. He added, “Old passports will be approved until the biometric passports are received in early November.”
The directorate affirms that “there is no going back from the decision to use the platform even after the arrival of all the required payments from biometric passports,” noting that “this matter saves the passport applicant the hassle of moving to public security centers and the possibility that his request will not be resolved due to a lack of papers or any other reason. The timings of the platform reduce crowding in the centers and organize the obtaining of the passport.”
Banking and guarantees
The batch of 150,000 biometric paspors that will arrive in early November is part of a quota that was supposed to be 1,100,000 paspors sufficient for one year. But the amount was reduced to less than one million after the allocated amount decreased from 14 to 13 million dollars. Between the approval of the appropriation in the House of Representatives and the opening of the appropriation for the transfer of the amount, the price of the “exchange dollar” on the basis of which the amount was transferred increased, which led to a decrease in the value of the transferred amount compared to the “fresh dollar”, due to the difference between the two “dollars.” Then the French manufacturer asked for “guarantees” with an enhanced financial credit “because Lebanon is a country whose ability to pay is questionable.”
In short, there is no return soon to the normal situation that allows obtaining the passport automatically, and the crisis may recur at any time.
Despite the great pressure exerted by Major General Ibrahim since July 2021 to provide the requirements to “liberate” the amount of money required to be transferred to the French company, and despite repeated warnings that stocks are running out, the government insisted, with its irresponsible performance, that the Lebanese be dragged into the cycle of waiting for a passport that was lost for months. Between the corridors of the government, the Banque du Liban and the Ministry of Finance, while obtaining it is still hostage to unusual procedures.
This is how the political authority excelled in perpetuating the reality of “arresting a people” and banning them from traveling after impoverishing, looting, humiliating and “burning” them with electricity, supermarket, petrol, medical, education and medicine bills. And when he decides to “vent” on a tourist trip abroad, or to immigrate in search of knowledge or work, or to “speak” in search of immigration and asylum, this government obliges him to stay inside his house, which lacks electricity, air conditioning, and water.
In fact, the General Directorate of Public Security launched a “governmental scandal” that reflected the stupidity of the authority and a failure to realize even its interest in facilitating the provision of credits for passports that generate billions, as the passport costs about 12 dollars, while the citizen pays its value today, one million and 200 thousand pounds afterwards. The Cabinet amended the pricing, and this difference goes directly to the finance.