Lebanon’s economic recovery plan will only repeat past failures

UANI Research Analyst David Daoud writes: "On April 30, Lebanon’s new Prime Minister Hassan Diab revealed his economic recovery plan and, along with his political allies, touted it as the panacea for Beirut’s financial woes. Since then, his government has been locked in negotiations with the International Monetary Fund (IMF), whose assistance—along with other foreign aid—is posited as the necessary precondition for jumpstarting economic recovery in the plan. But the IMF remains skeptical. Its spokesman Gerry Rice has said it is “premature to talk about any… financing right now.” Some of Lebanon’s negotiators with the IMF share that skepticism, two of whom—Henri Chaoul and Alain Bifani—have resigned in protest over Beirut’s obstinate resistance to genuine reform—and rightly so."