The Lebanese businessman Samir Khatib. (Credit: NNA)
BEIRUT — Lebanese businessman Samir Khatib, vice president of the engineering consultancy company Khatib & Alami — known to be close to Lebanese political circles — died Saturday morning at the age of 78, the company announced in a statement on social media.
"It is with great sadness that we announce today the passing of Samir Khatib, partner, executive vice president of the company and chairman of the Union of Lebanon and Gulf Businessmen's Councils," Khatib & Alami wrote on Facebook, paying tribute to a "highly respected leader" who was "dedicated to the growth of the company."
"In addition to heading the company's headquarters in Beirut, Samir Khatib played a key role in establishing and managing several other offices, including in Jeddah, Algiers and Cairo, and he helped guide and oversee the company's offices in Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Algeria, Egypt, Qatar and Iraq," the statement added.
Government contracts
The Lebanese Business Council paid tribute to Khatib and lamented a "loss for the Lebanese diaspora in [Saudi] Arabia and for the construction sector."
"The departed was active in the development of relations between Lebanon and the Gulf, and especially with [Saudi] Arabia, where he headed the Council for Lebanese and Gulf Affairs," added the council's statement which praised "the impact" of this body for the restoration of ties between the two countries in recent months, after Riyadh had decided to cut relations with Beirut for political reasons, related to Hezbollah.
Over the years Khatib & Alami has obtained dozens of public contracts, reported in 2019 an article in Commerce du Levant, among which a public-private partnership in the distribution of electricity in Beirut and the Bekaa, through KVA, a joint venture created with the Arabian Construction Company.
Candidate for prime minister
An engineer by training, having spent most of his career with Khatib & Alami, Khatib was known to be close to former Prime Minister Saad Hariri and his father, Rafik Hariri.
Saad Hariri paid tribute to the deceased in a tweet. "With the passing of Samir Khatib, I lose a great friend and Lebanon loses a man who left the footprints of his work in different parts of the country."
Khatib received the younger Hariri's support when he was approached in 2019 to fill the prime minister's post, after Hariri's government resigned, as the Oct. 2019 protest movement demanded.
He quickly withdrew from the race in favor of Saad Hariri himself, who eventually announced he would not be be a candidate for prime minister. At the time, the street was critical of the the businessman's candidacy, seeing him as being too close to a political political class they had repudiated.
In the midst of the 2018 government formation crisis, Khatib's proximity to power saw him assemble a large number of Lebanon's political representatives at a dinner in honor of UAE ambassador Hamad al-Chamsi at his residence in Mazboud, in his home locality of Iqlim al-Kharroub.
Some have compared his mediating role to that of former general security director Abbas Ibrahim, to whom he is related by marriage, one of his daughters having married Ibrahim's son.
Samir Khatib was married to Adele Khatib with whom he had three children.
His funeral will take place late Saturday evening in Mazboud.