–The Collapsed building in Ashrafieh (photo source) –
The dust, the actual physical dust, hasn’t settled yet on the 5-story building that collapsed in Ashrafieh on Sunday. But as I read the coverage of that story in the Daily Star, I already found what I blame for this disaster.
There are some times where we should acknowledge that a disaster is simply a matter of bad luck, timing, or fate. This is not one of those times. People are pointing fingers to vague targets: It’s the careless government, the ineffective politicians, the greedy landlord. To me, this is about a particular law that needs to be changed as soon as possible.
Back to the Daily Star article. The most important sentence for this post’s purposes is this one:
The apartment block is known to be in an area of mainly old buildings. It included 10 apartments each with a monthly rent of LL25,000.
The owner of this building gets paid every month L.L 250,000 ($166) in rent. $166 for 10 apartments combined! One more time: $166 in rent for 10 apartments! Where on earth will that person get the money to maintain that building? Heck he can’t even paint the building if he wanted to, let alone maintain it, inspect it regularly and take care of it.
Proponents of the rent law which allows people to pay “old rents” for certain buildings always mention “fairness” to poor people as one of the main reasons to keep it. Was it fair to them that the building collapsed on their heads because nobody cared enough to maintain it? Ask anyone you know if they’d rather be priced out of a place or crushed to death.
Politicians are now making promises about better inspection and more sturdy construction laws. Hogwash! People will forget about these long term promises as soon as the media glare leaves the scene. The next building collapse will be the problem of some other politicians. Besides, our political system is too inefficient to actively, methodically and perpetually check for the safety of buildings.
That task should fall on the owners of the buildings who have the biggest incentive to maintain them. Nobody wants to watch their source of income fall apart. But with those ridiculous rents they are being paid, they might as well give away their property, or worse, watch them collapse before their own eyes.
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I think there are many fingers to point out here!
First, the building in question is over 50 years old, with many apartments having more than 10 ppl. You got to ask yourself, can such building hold that much number of ppl?
Second, the laws, while I agree with you that 25000L.L. is a ridiculous rent, but do you really think that there are enough EFFECTIVE laws in Liban to force the land lord to do proper maintenance, even if the rent become 1000$??!
Third, rumors say that there is a huge construction site right next to this building, could these constructions cause cracks in the already weak foundations of the very old buildings? We can see how new TALL buildings are “eating” the old short ones, preventing even air or light to escape!!
Fourth, the ppl!! You really believe that they didn’t know that the building was too old to live in?
At the end, one can’t but feel sorry for the lost souls, seeing the injuries coming one after the other to the hospital, while we were trying our best to save them makes you feel sad, angry and frustrated…..
spot on mustapha, I actually wrote another post (different angle), but it very much aligns with what you said, and the origin/source of the problem.
Question is, what next? how can we solve it? Personally, I don’t want to sit on the side and write for politicians to take responsibility.
Thank you for the article following this very sad event.
For more about the old rent law, its impacts and more you can also visit:
http://www.timerime.com/en/timeline/941672/Old+Rent+Law+-+Lebanon/
There are many things to blame, and what you mentioned Mus is indeed one of them. But in addition, the municipality must also inspect buildings and deem them fit for habitation or condemn them, as is the case in many other countries, especially when everyone knew this building was about to collapse, including the people who lived there (check al-akhbar’s article which mentioned that the owner has been urging the people to evict for some time, and i guess people would not have left without some compensation!)
in the end, this incident is the result of a combination of bad laws, bad government, bad judgment and bad luck…what a stupid way to die
This may be just the beginning.. Any building must have maintenance done to it otherwise it falls. Cement used in buildings has a service life of 40 years at most, the current old rent law was modified and has been enforced for almost that long. The old renters don’t even spend $1 for maintenance and they spend almost that much for rent and still expect the old owner to foot the bill of housing them for free.
The thing is the only reason the people continued to live in that building is because it was 25,000 L.L.0 even if they knew it was a terrible building that could collapse on their head any minute. These people are poor. Its not just about rent laws but its also about working with and for the poor to ensure a standard of living. If people can’t afford to pay 250,000 L.L. to pay a half decent appt.. maybe the government can work on some sort of subsidy so the poor can live in those better buildings and still pay what they can afford i.e. 25,000 L.L.
Thereis no one in Lebanon who is so poor that 25000 lira is allthey can afford as rent. That is ridiculous.
It is not ridiculous. Salaries are so low. Some people can barely afford to live in Beirut if it was not for rent control.
Spot on. This is exactly what is wrong with our country…
True! the old rental law is horrific;
the problem of land prices and rental prices too; and finally the new constructions that are being built in old areas without proper studies;
didn’t the old rent laws apply to people who have been renting since the old rent applied? as in way back when? wouldn’t higher rents apply to anyone new coming in? i don’t think any of the foreign workers that were living in the place were there since before the war. so it can’t be just the rent laws. it seems it was a shabby building and it came down, on its own or maybe not? maybe the original builder bypassed some safeguards and paid the usual fines? there are a lot of questions and guesses but no real answers it seems to me.
I was wondering this too – about the rent laws only applying to people who had lived there for many years…
I guess the way it goes is of you are paying old rent, i.e. 25 000, you can rent out your own apartment (unofficially) at near market price, so you would be making a lot of free money that actually belongs to the owner.
c’est une preuve que le libanais est égoiste et ne pense qu’à lui même… à ce prix là j’ai envie de dire, tanpis pour eux et j’espère que ca sera une leçon. à ce prix là, on peut louer une tente et encore….
The foreign workers living in are brought in by landlords to make old rent tenants leave. It’s a degentrification strategy
to “o”:
The old landlords do not plan on having tenants leave on purpose. But in the past decades and in the absence of acceptable rental income and a housing strategy, landlords have taken all the socio-economic burden. They need to find alternative sources to live. As you know, often rental income from several apartments remains lower than the monthly salary of a housemaid. There is no other choice but to turn to new options, and when you cannot improve the living conditions of the building the only tenants you are going to have are often with limited resources. Finally, your argument about gentrification does not apply to this sad event. Here is the definition:
Gentrification and urban gentrification refer to the changes that result when wealthier people (“gentry”) acquire or rent property in low income and working class.
Hope this helps.
On the other hand it is impossible to talk about DEgentrification while prices in Achrafieh are on the increase! On the contrary it is only possible to talk about gentrification. But this desperate measure from the landlord can only be the result of twisted laws which went against the Lebanese constitution. For more readings:
http://www.rdl.com.lb/1997/1964/naim.htm
Cheers
If I were a bitter cynic, I’d suggest that the landlord himself had an incentive to collapse the building on the heads of the tenants so that he could sell the land for millions.
But I’m not a bitter cynic.
Of course you aren’t
YES. This is basic economics and it’s a sad example of the unintended consequences of unnecessary government intervention. Let the market decide and avoid the tragic, tragic, tragedy of the commons.