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PROTEST

Protesters gather in Saida against generator bills


Protesters gather in Saida against generator bills

Demonstrators gather in front of the municipality of Saida in South Lebanon on June 3, 2022. (Credit: L'Orient Today)

BEIRUT — Dozens of Saida residents held a sit-in Friday at the city’s municipality building to protest private generator bill increases, L’Orient Today’s correspondent in the area reports.

Here’s what we know:

    • The protest coincides with a municipality meeting including MPs from the area and private generator owners. The protest intends to “express the outrage” of the region’s inhabitants against generator owners and the fees they are charging to provide electricity. Saida MP Oussama Saad told L’Orient Today that “it is time to stop playing with peoples’ lives.”

    •The meeting’s outcome was later related in a statement, and asked generator owners for a “halt in [bill] collections and to not interrupt service for any reason” while adhering to the subscription prices set by the Energy Ministry. The Energy Ministry has been regularly issuing price lists for private generator subscriptions. The attendees noted a “wide gap between the Energy Ministry’s prices and the elevated and violating prices set by private generator owners,” adding that generator owners’ answer to the propositions decided on during the meeting were “expected during the next 24 hours.”

    • Friday morning, fuel prices sharply increased while other protests were announced, notably a strike by the Land Transport Unions scheduled for June 23. Complaints about generator bills and fuel prices have increased as 80 percent of Lebanon’s population has slipped under the poverty line and private generator bills reach multiples of the minimum wage.

    • In the third year of economic crisis in Lebanon, private generator subscriptions compensate for the electricity supply deficit of public utility Electricité du Liban, which provides only a few hours of power per day. 

BEIRUT — Dozens of Saida residents held a sit-in Friday at the city’s municipality building to protest private generator bill increases, L’Orient Today’s correspondent in the area reports.Here’s what we know:    • The protest coincides with a municipality meeting including MPs from the area and private generator owners. The protest intends to “express the outrage” of the...