SAWT BEIRUT INTERNATIONAL

| 9 December 2024, Monday |

What if you pay for electricity in fresh USD?

The Lebanese suffered the brunt of the lack of power and private generators for almost a year and a half… Things were reasonably okay at the time, despite a sense of embarrassment over the lack of what is considered the necessities of a normal existence in other nations.

However, after the removal of fuel subsidies and the sale of fuel in dollars, as well as the extremely harsh rationing, which in some areas reached 23 hours per day, the suffering was increasing in all Lebanese regions, especially since the owners of those private generators set out in most Lebanese regions to collect the subscription allowance in fresh USD, as these documents show. These customers, according to Sawt Beirut International, price the bill in fresh dollars, followed by the note: “Pay in Lebanese Pounds” to avoid legal repercussions, and thereby pay according to the black market exchange rate.

For example, in Saida, the municipality chose to allow, in violation of the law, private generator owners to collect bills in dollars, and on a weekly basis to avoid dollar manipulation.

However, the citizen is no longer able to pay, as evidenced by what happened in Baaklin – Chouf on Wednesday, January 5, 2022, when a group of angry citizens broke down the generators’ assembly office after requesting to collect the subscription in “fresh” dollars, and they also cut off a number of roads in the town.
According to a source monitoring the case, this is just the beginning since the high costs have affected everything and things are no longer what they were before, because the Lebanese citizen has had enough.

    Source:
  • Sawt Beirut International