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Joumblatt calls on government to work on IMF reforms rather than worry about daylight saving time

Joumblatt calls on government to work on IMF reforms rather than worry about daylight saving time

The leader of the Progressive Socialist Party Walid Joumblatt. (Credit: AFP file)

BEIRUT — The government should be working on the reforms required by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) rather than concerning itself with postponing or implementing daylight savings time, Walid Joumblatt, head of the Progressive Socialist Party (PSP), said in a tweet Sunday. Najib Mikati's caretaker government's decision to postpone daylight savings time for a month has drawn criticism from both Lebanon's residents and members of its political class.

“The country’s crisis is greater than advancing or delaying the clock, and there is no need to take decisions that pour into the hateful sectarian furnace. Let this government and this council return to translating the recommendations of the International Monetary Fund as they are,” Jumblatt said in his tweet. "Enough bargaining with the port and the airport and other issues," he added.

Meanwhile, the state-run National News Agency reported Sunday a statement from the secretary of the PSP affiliated "Democratic Gathering" parliamentary bloc, MP Hadi Abu al-Hassan, saying the MP has been in communication with Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri and caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati "in an attempt to find a way out of the crisis that arose following the decision to postpone daylight savings time." 

Abu al-Hassan's efforts come "to limit further divisions in the country … and come under the framework of Joumblatt’s tweet where he launched a clear position in this regard, but until this moment things have not yet crystallized completely,” the statement concluded. 

The decision to postpone daylight savings time in Lebanon took many by surprise and was adopted almost unilaterally following a discussion between caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati and Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri.

The Grand Serail announced Thursday that the change to daylight savings time, scheduled for midnight March 25/26, would be postponed until the end of April.

Also Thursday, the IMF's mission chief in Beirut said that Lebanon is in a very dangerous situation, one year after the country committed to reforms it has so far failed to implement.

The IMF urged the Lebanese government to halt borrowing from the central bank. IMF mission chief Ernesto Rigo said at a news conference in Beirut that the authorities should accelerate the implementation of conditions set for a $3 billion bailout from the fund. "One would have expected more in terms of implementation and approval of legislation" related to reforms, he said, noting "very slow" progress. "Lebanon is in a very dangerous situation," he added, in unusually frank remarks.

Regarding the delayed time change, several media outlets, archdioceses and schools said Saturday that they will not abide by the decision to postpone by one month the transition to daylight savings time. Some media outlets said in a statement that they decided to go ahead with the time change "to protest the decision of the [caretaker] prime minister."

Some view Mikati's decision on daylight savings time as confessional, saying that it was made in view of the impact it would have on the country's Muslim population during the month of Ramadan when many members of the faith fast from sunrise to sunset. Others consider that Mikati's and Berri's decision is an attempt to distract the public opinion from the current crises in Lebanon.

BEIRUT — The government should be working on the reforms required by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) rather than concerning itself with postponing or implementing daylight savings time, Walid Joumblatt, head of the Progressive Socialist Party (PSP), said in a tweet Sunday. Najib Mikati's caretaker government's decision to postpone daylight savings time for a month has drawn criticism from...