BEIRUT: The rival March 8 and 14 camps engaged in a new war of words Monday over recent remarks by Telecommunications Minister Charbel Nahhas, with Parliamentary Future bloc MP Riad Rahhal calling for Nahhas’ resignation for insulting Prime Minister Saad Hariri.
Hizbullah MP Nawwaf Moussawi, meanwhile, said attacks on Nahhas were tantamount to attacks against his party.
During last week’s Cabinet session which deferred discussion of the controversial issue of “false witnesses,” Nahhas, who belongs to the March 8 camp, was reported to have accused Hariri of coming under pressure from Israel and the international community for his tough position on the UN-backed Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL). The STL is probing the 2005 killing of Hariri’s father, former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri.
Hariri rejected Nahhas’ accusation.
Nahhas belongs to the Parliamentary Change and Reform bloc headed by Hizbullah ally MP Michel Aoun.
The two camps are already locked in a war of words over the performance of former Prime Minister Fouad Siniora’s government during the 2006 Israeli war on Lebanon. Hizbullah has accused Siniora of seeking to prolong the war in a bid to destroy the group’s military infrastructure, a charge strongly denied by Siniora.
In a statement carried by the state-run National News Agency (NNA) Monday, Rahhal rejected threats, intimidation and accusations of treachery made by the March 8 camp against Hariri and March 14 leaders.
Addressing Nahhas, Rahhal said, “Your bankrupt discourse only serves Israel’s interest. There are direct [Israeli] agents and your statement gives you the capacity of an indirect agent of the [Israeli] enemy.”
Calling Nahhas a failure at the Telecommunications Ministry, Rahhal said, “What is required is the dismissal of the minister who dared to make dangerous accusations during a session chaired by the president and insults against presidents and all the ministers.”
MP Ziad al-Kaderi, a member of Future bloc, also lashed out at Nahhas Monday, accusing him of violating the law by spending on the mobile phone operation from outside the state budget.
“The spending on [mobile phone] investment, worth more than tens of million dollars, is not mentioned in the Telecommunications Ministry’s budget which is attached to the state budget,” Kaderi told a news conference at Parliament. He said Nahhas takes the money from revenue collected from the mobile phone sector.
“The minister is violating the Constitution and law. What’s surprising is that he is violating the principle of a comprehensive budget which he has been advocating, but which he does not apply at his ministry,” Kaderi said. “Why are you spending on the mobile phone sector from outside the [state] budget, while keeping a wide margin to use revenues before transferring them to the Telecommunications Ministry?”
Meanwhile, Hizbullah declared solidarity with Nahhas in the face of the March 14 campaign against him, warning against attempts to harm the minister.
Meanwhile, Hizbullah declared solidarity with Nahhas in the face of the March 14 campaign against him, warning against attempts to harm the minister.
“We totally reject the threat against Minister Nahhas. We condemn the unfamiliar threat which constitutes a coup against the logic of state and its traditions,” MP Moussawi said in a statement Monday released by Hizbullah’s media office. “We announce our full and absolute solidarity with Minister Nahhas. We consider that any attempt to harm him is tantamount to harming the political line of our camp with all its factions.”
Moussawi praised Nahhas as “a highly efficient and skilled” minister in running his ministry and for his national commitment to the Resistance against the Israeli aggression. “In this regard, we highly appreciate his role in protecting the telecommunications sector against the ‘Israeli communications aggression,’” he said, referring to communications employees who have been arrested by Lebanese authorities on charges of collaborating with Israel.
Hizbullah MP Ali Fayyad also defended Nahhas, saying that the “systematic campaign” against the minister reflected the “degradation of political discourse” by March 14 politicians.
“It is regrettable that Minister Nahhas is met with an open attack for his role in [securing] an international condemnation of the Israeli violations of the telecommunications sector in Lebanon instead of praising him,” Fayyad said in a statement Monday carried by the NNA.
Nahhas said last month Israel has been able to alter telecommunications-related data in Lebanon “for a very long time,” in the wake of revelations that alleged Israeli agents had occupied sensitive posts in the sector.
Nahhas spoke at a news conference about the recent endorsement of Resolution 75 by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), condemning Israeli violations of Lebanon’s telecommunications infrastructure.
Resolution 75 said Lebanon’s land and cellular networks have been and continue to be subject to piracy, interference and obstruction by Israel. –The Daily Star
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