Public Administration between modernization and confessionalism

The Conference on ‘Public Administration and National Integration: Partnership and Modernization’ organized by the Maronite League in collaboration with Konrad Adenauer Foundation concluded a two-day working sessions on January 15 and 16 at Sagesse University- Ashrafieh. The conference sought to develop clear benchmarks based on expertise, qualifications and techniques as a preparatory step to achieve an autonomous administration. In this respect, Ibrahim Jabbur, the Rapporteur of the League’s Personnel and Public Administrations Committee, noted that the laws regulating the administration system in Lebanon are in need of upgrading, which can only be realized by ending political manipulation and leaving the work to the Civil Service and Central Inspection Bureau authorities. For his part, the chief of the Christian NGO for Employment, LABORA, Father Toni Khadra, stressed that the agency seeks to find solutions to unemployment problems for all the Lebanese, and particularly to Christians, by providing them with the proper training and motivation to assume public jobs, be successful and contribute to maintaining national (i.e. confessional) equilibrium. LABORA’s objectives are aimed to build a culture that respects personal competence as opposed to nepotism, political favoritism and sectarian quotas (!). 

While the first round of meetings addressed the issue of ‘public administration and governance systems’, the second round mainly focused on decentralization and public employment. In this respect, former minister Ziad Barud stated that “decentralization does not infringe on the central administration or on the role and powers of municipalities, warning against draining municipal financial resources”. He pointed out that the centralized management of waste in the Naameh landfill has “streamlined chaos in all regions, except for Saida, Byblos and other constituencies that resorted to a federal treatment of the problem”. The third session, on the other hand, tackled ‘administrative reform: reality and prospects, with an intervention from MP Ghassan Mkheiber who outlined the reality of corruption and strategies to fight against in Lebanon. Finally, former minister Ibrahim Chamseddine concluded that political interference incapacitates the processes of monitoring and accountability. (An Nahar, Al Mustaqbal, Al Diyar, January 16 and 18, 2016)