“Thief! Thief! The people want the fall of the regime!” These were the chants that met Lebanon’s Prime Minister Saad Hariri in Beirut today as thousands protested a series of tax hikes. The moment was captured on video by BBC journalist Ben James:
PM @saadhariri just arrived at the protest in a car. This is what happened. #Beirut#ضد_الضريبه_عالفقير pic.twitter.com/wca2jPpLXP
— Ben James (@BenJourno) March 19, 2017
A small number of water bottles and other objects were thrown at the Prime Minister as he was escorted from the scene by his security detail.
Half an hour later the Prime Minister tweeted an invitation to the organizers of the protest, asking them to engage with him in a “positive spirit”:
ادعو منظمي التظاهرة الى تشكيل لجنة ترفع مطالبهم لمناقشتها بروح إيجابية
— Saad Hariri (@saadhariri) March 19, 2017
I invite the organizers of these protests to form a committee to raise their demands to discuss them in a positive spirit.
The Lebanese newspaper an-Nahar reported that the protests came after Lebanon’s parliament approved a number of tax hikes on Thursday, but failed to pass the public sector wage increase that had been the reason given for the increases.
Lebanese had taken to twitter using the hashatg #ضد_الضريبه_عالفقير (against the tax on the poor) to highlight their reasons for protesting.
التظاهرة ضد الضرائب والطبقة السياسية الحاكمة الفاسدة...#ضد_الضريبة_عالفقير #لبنان pic.twitter.com/akunxIucpe
— Rania El Khatib (@rania_elkhatib) March 19, 2017
Protest against taxes and the corrupt ruling class.
Lebanese political analyst Kareem Chehayeb told Al Bawaba that the main impetus for protests came from people who supported wage increases for public servants, but opposed taxes that would affect ordinary people.
“There’s a lot of money that’s being squandered or laundered or virtually stolen by the government, so people are saying to the government ‘with all the money you’ve been squandering, you might as well just use that, rather than tax the poor.’”
Transparency International, an anti-corruption NGO, placed Lebanon 136th out of 176 countries for corruption in 2016.
Chehayeb also highlighted the joining of left-leaning social movements, such as You Stink, and the right-wing Kataeb party in the protests.
“It’s possible the backlash, and the broad coalition of political forces protesting the raises, will force a repeal of the raise. All eyes will be on Wednesday’s parliamentary session, which is the next time the issue will be discussed.”
