BEIRUT: The Cabinet approved Thursday the appointment of a new five-member Banking Control Commission despite objections from some ministers, Information Minister Ramzi Joreige said.
Speaker Nabih Berri praised Cabinet’s decision despite reservations voiced by a number of ministers.
“This encourages more productivity in Cabinet work,” he was quoted as saying by visitors at his Ain al-Tineh residence. “This is a new indication of Cabinet’s new start.”
“The appointment of the Banking Control Commission was essential despite the objection by a number of ministers,” Berri said. He added that Lebanon would have faced a problem with the outside world had the appointment not been made.
Berri, according to the visitors, said he would call for more than one legislative session to approve essential draft laws labeled under the slogan “essential legislation.”
He said he hoped parliamentary committees would finalize the public sector wage and ranks scale so it could be put on the agenda of a legislative session that he would later call.
Berri earlier Thursday called for a joint meeting of the parliamentary Finance, Budget, Justice, Administration, Defense, Interior, Education and Cultural committees next Tuesday to study the salary and ranks scale.
The speaker tasked MP Ibrahim Kanaan, head of the parliamentary Finance and Budget Committee, to chair Tuesday’s meeting over the wage hike bill, the National News Agency reported.
The BCC’s new members are Samir Hammoud as president, and Joseph Sarkis, Ahmad Safa, Munir Alyan and Sami Azar as members, Joreige told reporters after the Cabinet session chaired by Prime Minister Tammam Salam at the Grand Serail.
Each of the five members represented a different religious sect, in line with the state’s power sharing policy.
Cabinet approved the appointments despite opposition from two ministers by resorting to a new consensus formula adopted last week. The formula does not require the unanimous support of all 24 ministers to approve decisions as had been the case in the past during the presidential vacuum.
The Cabinet overrode objections to the appointments because the ministers who opposed the move feared the issue would be put up for a vote in the absence of a consensus, ministerial sources said.
The sources said Salam’s suspension of the Cabinet sessions for two weeks due to a row over the decision-making mechanism had achieved its goal without resorting to the old formula, which required the unanimous support of all 24 ministers.
The smooth appointment of the BCC’s members despite reservations by some ministers might pave the way for the approval of other public appointments, the sources said.
The Cabinet also approved a request issued by the Public Works Ministry calling for maintenance work to be carried out on roads following severe damage caused by a series of storms that battered Lebanon over the past two months.
Before entering the session, ministers had voiced contradictory views about the BCC appointments.
Finance Minister Ali Hasan Khalil, from the March 8 coalition, had said he was “fully ready” to discuss the matter, stressing that he was adamantly opposed to “extending or renewing” the commission’s term, which expires on March 17.
March 14 Telecoms Minister Boutros Harb stressed that “extension” is an option in case there was no agreement on the names of candidates on the commission.
Some ministers initially expressed reservations over the appointments because new members are supposed to take an oath before the president.
Lebanon has been without president for more than nine months.