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ECONOMIC CRISIS

Private generator owners detained in Saida for violating fuel costs

Private generator owners detained in Saida for violating fuel costs

A citizen repeatedly filling his own car’s tank and then decanting the gas from it into plastic vessels for resale. (Credit: Mohammad Yassine/L'Orient-Le Jour)

BEIRUT — Three private generator owners were detained Tuesday in Saida by members of the State Security for violating the pricing placed by the Energy Ministry in order to regulate the market, the state-run National News Agency reported.

Here’s what we know:

    • According to the NNA, in compliance with a request from the Public Prosecutor of South Lebanon, Judge Raheef Ramadan, the three violators signed a pledge to return the discrepancies in bills to citizens for the month of May and to abide by the pricing of the Energy Ministry as a condition for their release.

    • Dozens of Saida residents held a sit-in Friday at the city’s municipality to protest private generator bill hikes. The protest intended 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.”

    • Meanwhile, a meeting on Friday between the municipality, MPs from the area and private generator owners was organized in Saida. Saida’s Municipality issued a statement regretting that "despite all the facilities provided to [private] generator owners in order to reach equitable solutions, [the solutions] were rejected.” The municipality also called on citizens to resort to the judiciary in case of any violation.

    • As the country reels from almost three years of a deep economic crisis, Lebanon’s crippled power sector heavily relies on private generator owners, who provide a crucial backup that is barely enough to provide 24/7 supply. The state electricity provider, Electricité du Liban, is vulnerable to blackouts, and in some areas only manages to deliver electricity for merely two hours a day.

    • In a counter move, private generator owners in Saida later on Tuesday staged a sit-in in front of the city’s government brigade, in solidarity with the three detainees by State Security for violating the Energy Ministry’s pricing.

    • Claiming that private generator owners are purchasing diesel at a price equivalent to the black market rate, Imad Saad, a private generator owner who was present at the protest, said that “we submitted a request to the municipality to provide us with diesel at the Sayrafa rate, but no one helped us.” Adding that “we came to turn ourselves in because we are hungry and we have no money to pay for the price of diesel.”

    • The Lira rate on the parallel market has been below the exchange rate of the central bank, known as the Sayrafa platform, for the most part since the Sayrafa’s launch in May 2021. The central bank has been spending dollars from its foreign reserves to fund Sayrafa rates.

    • Following the sit-in, private generator owners issued a statement saying that they are willing to discuss a thought-out pricing for generator subscriptions with the municipality and the public prosecutor of South Lebanon “in a way that preserves the right of the citizen on one hand and the right of the generator owner on the other, so that we are able to continue our work without any losses.”

BEIRUT — Three private generator owners were detained Tuesday in Saida by members of the State Security for violating the pricing placed by the Energy Ministry in order to regulate the market, the state-run National News Agency reported. Here’s what we know:    • According to the NNA, in compliance with a request from the Public Prosecutor of South Lebanon, Judge Raheef Ramadan,...