بين يدي لبنان

2 التعليقات “بين يدي لبنان”

1. Laura Abboud
   Dear Mr. Nabih Berri July,23,2012
   and Lebanese Parliament Members,
   Ramadan Kareem. In this holiest of times, we write to you to ask you to do the will of Allah, to restore the property rights of all Lebanese citizens. You now have the power to correct this unconstitutional miscarriage of justice that previous administrations have allowed to continue for so many years by issuing the new rent law. This new law will complete a free market place in Lebanon’s Real Estate market and will give back to all Lebanese citizens their God given property rights. That will be the legacy of this Lebanese parliament. That is why Lebanon needs this law right away!
   The time has come to stop the suffering and the losses we have incurred for so long. The opportunity costs alone have been unbearable. Losing the opportunity to do whatever we wanted with our properties has damaged us in ways you can’t even imagine, for over 40 years! It is time to end this agony and distress and to have legal equality for all Lebanese.
   The new rent law will prevent further loss of lives and injuries from more collapsing buildings and will uphold The Constitution of Lebanon. It will reinstate our property rights! Indeed, many old buildings cannot endure much more deferred maintenance. So, resolving this unjust situation by passing the new law is a win-win outcome for all. That’s why it was studied for so long. We know it is not a complete cure for both sides, but it is a fair compromise that needs to be implemented now.
   Please do not let future Lebanese generations inherit this unjust misery in our country. Help us resolve this chaos. We are counting on you to give us back our dignity and to give Lebanon back the respect it deserves. Let us stop this discrimination in Lebanon. Please issue the new rent law.
   Sincerely,
   Concerned Lebanese Citizens
   Old owners of Lebanon

2. Attention TO:

   His Excellency The British Ambassador To Beirut-Lebanon MR.Tom Fletcher,

   Dear HM.British Ambassador,

   We seek your help after we’ve exhausted all legal options in our country of Lebanon to amend an unjust

   and cruel rent law that has taken away our rights to our properties for over 40 years. We seek your help in

   the name of the thousands of Lebanese families known as the “old owners”, these families that have

   become impoverished, broke and helpless, incapable of providing food, education or health-care to their

   family members.

   In fact the Lebanese constitution guarantees the right to ownership as it clearly states in its preamble the

   “The economic system is free and ensures private initiative and the right to private property” and in

   “Article 15 [Property] Rights of ownership are protected by law. No one’s property may be

   expropriated except for reasons of public utility in cases established by law and after fair

   compensation has been paid beforehand”. But we the “old owners” and against our constitution’s laws

   have been unjustly marginalized and had these rights unjustly stripped away from us despite the fact that

   we are also Lebanese citizens. This law has prevented us from benefiting and using our properties for so

   many years, yet it has granted the renters the ability to stay in our properties indefinitely, without our

   consent, and with no increase in rent. Most damning, it also granted the renters the ability to “pass on” the

   old lease to their children or to whomever they want after they die, and if the owner is to sell his property,

   he/she is required to give 40% of the property’s sale value to the renter. Incredibly, most “old renters”

   benefiting from that old rent law belong to the rich and powerful class: many are MPs (Members of

   Parliament), ministers in the Lebanese government, CEOs and rich business people, and these people are

   renting out our properties for amounts that are valued at less than 10% the minimum wage in Lebanon.

   This means that the average value of rent being paid is not enough to buy bread or water for our families

   for a couple days and yet these “old renters” are abusing their powers to keep the status quo and keep the

   old rent law unchanged despite its unconstitutionality. It is worth to mention here that the old rent law

   does not distinguish between old residential leases from old commercial leases. Merchants and tradesmen

   who were able to ride the wave of inflation and hence were not affected by the devaluation of our

   currency, are still paying old rents values but charge for their services and goods the current prices.

   The continued application of this unjust and cruel law has been the major factor behind the exodus of the

   majority of the Lebanese youth in order to secure their livelihoods and residence, especially since they’ve

   lost all hope in having their properties restored to them. In addition, investors and contractors for new

   residential buildings are no longer building for rental purposes but for sale only, as they publicly declared

   in July 2, 2011, simply because they are afraid for their investments to be eventually confiscated like ours.

   The exodus of course is cause for additional suffering and hardship to the old owners as it leads to the

   separation and break up of families. In many cases, extreme poverty is forcing the old owners to sell their

   properties to foreign investors, and also forces them reluctantly to give up 40% of the sale’s share to the

   old renter! This fact is causing an alarming change in the demographic composition of Lebanon,
   especially in the capital Beirut where the percentage of foreign ownership is higher than anywhere else in
   the world.
   Dear British Ambassador, the problem lies with the “Administration and Justice Committee” which was
   commissioned in 1990 by the Lebanese Parliament to fix and amend the old rent law in order to give us
   back our rights. But instead, its consequent members since 1990 have only been issuing empty promises
   to finish “studying” and “releasing” the replacement law. For 21 long years to date, members of the
   “Administration and Justice Committee” have been mysteriously delaying and postponing the new rent
   law while many old owners have perished and died from their inaptitude to provide food and medical
   treatment, simply because they’re forbidden to benefit from their investments in their properties. And
   every year with higher food prices and inflation, the same old frozen rent are kept at their same rate
   causing even more hardship.
   For the aforementioned reasons, and because our incessant pleas with the Lebanese government and the
   “Administration and Justice Committee” have been all met with empty promises, we were compelled to
   seek your help dear Ambassador Fletcher, and through your assistance to all the Local and
   international organizations that deal with human rights to bring the attention to our plight. We seek your
   help to intervene with the Lebanese government and press them into releasing the new rent law
   immediately so that it can save the lives of thousands of deprived, old and broke old owners. This will
   also help in bringing back the expatriates home and solve the serious housing problem in Lebanon as it
   will give confidence again to contractors to build for renting purposes instead of sale.
   In the hopes that you would sympathize with our plight, we extremely value your role in aiding the
   persecuted and helping those in need in the world…
   Sincerely,
   Serge Doumit on the behalf of The Committee for the Defense of Property-Owners’ rights in Lebanon
   Connecticut USA, 11-10-2012.
   Old Landlords of Lebanon.

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