Summary
After a delay, President Michel Aoun Monday signed the salary scale and tax hike laws that will increase a number of taxes including a 1 percentage point rise in the value added tax. In a statement, the office of the presidency announced that Aoun had signed both laws and issued them based on constitutional guidelines. Parliament endorsed the laws last month during a two-day legislative session.
Berri has been one of the most ardent supporters of the bill and his chief aide Finance Minister Ali Hasan Khalil has maintained that the additional taxes would not impact poorer constituents.
Khalil and Metn MP Ibrahim Kanaan from Aoun's Free Patriotic Movement were tasked with introducing amendments to address what the president had described as "gaps" in the provisions relating to the new tax measures.
Following its weekly meeting, the Kataeb Party's politburo released a statement expressing its "disappointment" that the president had signed the tax increase laws.
...