News Every Day | 31 December 2021, 16:37

Lebanon’s New Year Resolutions… hopefully

The following is a work of satire and black humor forecasting what Lebanon’s so-called political elite will do during 2022 to fix the sinking ship.

The country’s ruling establishment has proven over the year to be incorrigible, and their appetite for corruption is only matched with their delusion and inability to take responsibility for the country’s terrible state of affairs.

I have deliberately decided not to mention the President of the Republic in this article simply because his physical and mental state precludes him from carrying out the office of the President but more so because article 384 of the Lebanese penal code states: “Whoever insults the head of state, shall be punished by imprisonment from six months to two years,” a predicament I wish to avoid or perhaps delay - for the time being at least.

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The Lebanese have a philosophy that the hangover kicks in once the night of drinking ends. This is the case with many of those at large, but mainly the politicians who have for years delivered nothing but empty promises and have gone out of their way to derail and obstruct real change from taking place. But, in Lebanon 2022, perhaps some of these chaps might grow a conscious and finally come up with a New Year’s resolution which will not peter out like the decision to quit smoking or commit to a healthy diet.

For Najib Mikati, the current Prime Minister and billionaire, 2022 will be a year when he finally decides to change his political hairdo and stop playing bosom and admit that it was unethical to take out millions of dollars of subsidies loans to finance the purchase of penthouses and luxury apartments. Mikati, a former business partner of Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad, might rethink his decision to invest in the telecom sector in Myanmar and avoid funding the ruling internationally unrecognized Junta. Mikati might perhaps have an epiphany and donate his fortune to the people of his city Tripoli which is one of the poorest and underdeveloped towns on the Mediterranean.

As for Nabih Berri, the aging speaker of parliament who has occupied this office since 1992, 2022 will be a year when he finally decides to retire and allow for someone other than his sons or cronies to assume the post. Berri, who has time and again violated the Lebanese constitution and skewed the laws to fit his vision and coincidently accumulated enormous wealth in the process, will finally confess publicly and ask the Lebanese people for forgiveness. Hopefully, he will go into exile in Sierra Leone, where he was born.

The most hated man in Lebanon (and there are plenty of contenders), Gebran Bassil - President Aoun’s son-in-law and his political heir - will undergo plastic surgery and leg-lengthening surgery in a beautification process that might improve his chances of becoming the next president. Faithful to his earlier promises as Minister of Power to provide 24/7 electricity, water, and extracting gas from the untapped fields in the Mediterranean, Bassil will take it upon himself to go door to door and give each household a bag of candles and a gallon of water. In exchange, he will beg of them to sign a petition to remove him from the US sanctions list, which he earned for his unfathomed appetite for corruption.

In 2022, the syndicate of Lebanese warlord/feudal lords and shady businessmen will convene and decide to invest the their illicitly accumulated fortunes in stem cell research which will extend their lives by slowing down the aging process, allowing them to stay in power indefinitely. The only good thing from this scenario is that many Lebanese people will not be alive to witness this monstrous scientific calamity.

On his next visit to Lebanon, French President Emmanuel Macron will undertake another trip and drink tea and fruit and will slowly realize that the local-grown produce is concealing Captagon pills. He will find out that the drugs are intended for smuggling to the Gulf by both Hezbollah and the Syrian regime, which ironically, Macron is trying to normalize ties.

The Axis of Fake Fruit Exporters will realize that its efforts and resources spent manufacturing and stashing amphetamines in Lebanese agriculture goods is unproductive. They can make more money by farming and exporting fruit and vegetables legally.

As a result, Hezbollah will announce its transition into a farmer’s coop and exchange its missile arsenal with hand forks, shovels, and tractors. The terrorists will direct their zeal for mayhem and destruction to farming the fertile land of Beqaa Valley to the east of the country.

The year 2022 will finally be when the Lebanese minister of interior and various other judicial actors will tell the Lebanese who are manufacturing and smuggling these pills. Oh, and they might as well finally reveal who was responsible for the Beirut port explosion in 2020 while dropping the ridiculous claim that it was the result of a welding accident.

And a nod to the last political player manipulating the current state of affairs to maintain the crises in Lebanon. Voldemort has a nice ring to it. I’ll classify him as he that shall not be named.

I hope Voldemort finds it easier to access medical products than the rest of the country. I can only imagine the costs of buying an ever-increasing need for Vitamin D supplements as he moves under cover of darkness in the south of the country, hiding in peoples’ basements. A walk in the park or perhaps a visit to the cedars for a picnic is always good. A sunny disposition might help his depressing view of the world.

Given that the scenarios above are wishful thinking at best, the Lebanese are better off hoping that a Martian expedition abducts their politicians and keep them for years, probing their cavities for the real mystery of the universe.

Regardless of how 2022 plays out, the Lebanese people need to grasp that no one is interested nor willing to help them out of their self-inflicted crisis and that their salvation can only come if they finally decide to become themselves superheroes to fight off the many devils and villains they supported over the years.

Until then, Happy New Year.

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