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Telecoms Ministry employees go on strike

Telecoms Ministry employees go on strike

Telecoms Minister employees stage a sit-in Tripoli, North Lebanon, Jan. 17, 2023. (Credit: NNA)

BEIRUT — Telecommunications Ministry employees in Tripoli and Akkar staged sit-ins Tuesday morning to demand the Finance Ministry settle their outstanding salaries, L'Orient Today's correspondent in the North reported.

In a statement released on Monday, the workers warned they would observe a strike "in protest against the Finance Ministry's withholding of their salaries for three months now, and to demand a quick solution to it."

In Halba, Akkar governorate, telecomms employees arrived at their jobs Tuesday morning only to close their sales offices and said they would refrain from any technical or administrative work, according to L'Orient Today's correspondent.

In Saida, South Lebanon, employees of the Lebanese state-owned telecoms operator Ogero also staged a sit-in in solidarity with "their colleagues in the Telecommunications Ministry" to demand their salaries, L'Orient Today's correspondent in the South reported.

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Caretaker Telecommunications Minister Johnny Corm was not immediately available for comment. 

The administrative head of the Public Sector Employees Association, Ibrahim Nahal, participated in the sit-in in Tripoli Tuesday, where he said the workers were "raising a cry and announcing a warning strike."

"We have closed all institutions, sales offices, etc. For three months, we have not received our salaries or supplementary [payments]," Nahal said, adding that the workers have also not received their government-mandated transportation allowances "for six months."

Nahal also warned that the telecoms ministry workers will "resort to escalation" if the government fails to address their demands.

The head of the Federation of Workers and Employees Unions in the North, Shadi al-Sayed, was also present at the protest and called for "quick and effective action that secures the rights of employees in telecommunications throughout Lebanon," demanding  that "the Finance Minister take action," and adding that "a governmental meeting is necessary to discuss these files and sign the submissions decrees that were approved." 

A spokesperson for the caretaker Finance Minister Youssef al-Khalil was not immediately available for comment. 

Controversy over the caretaker cabinet’s ability to meet amid the presidential vacuum opened by the end of Michel Aoun’s term on Oct. 31 has stalled the approval of funding for several utilities and salary settlements in Lebanon, including payments of fuel to power EDL power plants.

Meanwhile, Caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati has scheduled a cabinet session for Wednesday. The last time Mikati convened his cabinet in mid-December to address an agenda focused on social and medical aid amid Lebanon's ongoing economic crisis, it was met with a boycott of several ministers close to the Free Patriotic Movement.

This is not the first time employees of Lebanon's telecoms sector go on strike. In early December, the country's cell phone operators, Alfa and Touch, went on a strike demanding their working conditions be improved. In September, the same employees went on an open strike demanding a salary increase from the caretaker Telecoms Minister, before ending it with a sealed agreement, the details of which were not provided to the press.

Additional reporting by Michel Hallak and Muntasser Abdallah

BEIRUT — Telecommunications Ministry employees in Tripoli and Akkar staged sit-ins Tuesday morning to demand the Finance Ministry settle their outstanding salaries, L'Orient Today's correspondent in the North reported.In a statement released on Monday, the workers warned they would observe a strike "in protest against the Finance Ministry's withholding of their salaries for three months now,...