Lebanon approves $18 million to hold election

Lebanon's government on Tuesday approved the allocation of 360 billion Lebanese pounds ($18 mln) for parliamentary elections, a minister who attended the cabinet meeting told Reuters.

Lebanon went into financial meltdown in 2019 and some officials had raised concerns over elections potentially being postponed due to financial constraints.

Lebanon is in the throes of the worst financial and economic crisis in its history that has sunk the once middle-class country into poverty.

The crisis is rooted in years of corruption and mismanagement by the same political class that has ruled for years. Lebanon is running out of foreign reserves and has gradually lifted subsidies on essential goods, including fuel and medicines.

But the government has yet to implement a social safety program or draft a recovery plan to negotiate with the International Monetary Fund.

The crisis caused the national currency to lose more than 90 percent of its value to the dollar while banks, fearing bankruptcy, have limited people’s access to their deposits in local and foreign currency. Meanwhile inflation has soared and prices increased.

(Reuters)