A man carrying license plates at the vehicle registration center (Nafaa) in Dekwaneh. (Credit: Mohammad Yassine/L'Orient-Le Jour)
Lebanon's main vehicle registration center (Nafaa) will "exceptionally" open its doors on Sunday, May 26, as well as daily during the coming week, to enable owners to recover vehicles, particularly motorcycles and cars, that have been seized by the army in recent days. In annoucing the opening days, the center, which is located in Dekwaneh just north of Beirut, said it is "acting in accordance with the directives of Interior Minister Bassam Mawlawi."
Earlier this week, the caretaker minister launched a security plan, implemented by the Internal Security Forces (ISF), in Beirut and its suburbs. Under the plan, the ISF set up checkpoints to "maintain security and order" and to reduce the circulation of illegal motorcycles and vehicles (such as those with missing license plates, those lacking the correct registration and licenses, and those reported stolen), according to a statement issued by the security body. The ISFs justified its decision by stating that, according to statistics, often vehicles that fall into these categories are used to commit crimes.
The security plan, under which a large number of vehicles were seized, has been widely criticized , as many motorists and motorcyclists have been unable to get their papers in order in recent years due to repeated and sometimes extended closures of the vehicle registration centers and the backlogs these closures create.
Responding to criticism, Mawlawi on Wednesday said that "the Nafaa is open to all, even at weekends, and within two months at most, the Lebanese will be able to carry out their procedures computerized."