Bright Ideas From The Aounist Ministers

Fresh ideas from the fresh ministers. Unbridled ambition or pitiful naiveté?

(Photo source)

Perhaps it’s because they never really got to navigate the labyrinth of governance in Lebanon, but Gebran Bassil, our new minister of Telecommunications and Alain Tabourian, our new minister of energy and water, — both Aoun loyalists — have brandished some sensible plans for their tenures.

They both saw something terribly wrong in the way things are going and suggested fixes, perhaps immaturely, and perhaps off the top of their minds. But we’re talking about the kind of obvious stuff that makes you wonder: Why didn’t anyone try to do something about this before?

Mr. Gebran Bassil saw that Lebanon has one of the highest cellphone rates in the world (30 cents per SMS!!), and made fee reduction a priority. Mr. Alain Tabourian, a succesful businessman and philantropist, saw that the government is paying way too much subsidy for electricity and came up with a plan: Let’s charge electricity hoggers (Like ABC mall in the picture above) market prices while keeping the subsidy for those who use less power like your average mom & pop stores. To me that makes perfect sense and it’s about time(although I think exceptions should be made for the Lebanese industry to keep it competitive.)

Perhaps the ministers are just being naive, or worse, populists for political gains in the next elections. But at least they have started a conversation about matters the Lebanese really care about.