Close to 100,000 applications have been filed for long-delayed social assistance programs. (Credit: IMPACT Lebanon)
BEIRUT — The state IMPACT data transparency organization running registrations for two social assistance programs said Saturday that it expects continuing high rates of registrants.
Here is what we know:
• “The number of registrations is still going up with 90,665 numbers of applicants. We anticipate this high volume of applications to be sustained,” IMPACT said in a tweet Saturday, three days after the platform for registration was launched.
• According to IMPACT’s live tracker, 95,625 applications for social assistance programs have been filed as of Saturday afternoon.
• On Wednesday, Lebanese officials announced the roll-out of a registration platform for the World Bank-funded Emergency Social Safety Net (ESSN) program as well as a separate government ration card, two and a half months after registrations were supposed to start. The first payments from the programs are not expected to be made to beneficiaries until March.
• While the World Bank has greenlit a $246 million loan for the ESSN program, its launch has been delayed by changes to the program made by the Lebanese Parliament without approval from the World Bank. The Parliament is expected to tackle amendments regarding the issue on Tuesday.
• Another ration card to provide cash payments to vulnerable families was approved by the Parliament in June, but its funding remains in question. World Bank regional director Saroj Kumar Jha told L’Orient Today that the Lebanese government filed a formal request with the international organization to provide funding. Before this can happen though, the ESSN program needs to get off the ground, he added.