Open letter to H.E. Minister Gibran Bassil, Lebanese Minister of foreign affairs.
We have learnt from the media that the Lebanese Minister for Foreign Affairs Mr Gibran Basil is working seriously to unify the World Lebanese Cultural Union, a move that we strongly support and look forward to happen.
We also learnt, again through the media, that representatives from the three fractions of the WLCU have met and are meeting to discuss the unification.
As we have no knowledge about the minutes of those meetings, we (past and present officials in the WLCU) would like to draw everybody’s attention to a very serious issue presiding in the heart of problem that divided the WLCU since 1994: it is article 12 of the dissolved Lebanese Ministry of Immigration. This article was later adopted or transferred to the Department of Lebanese Expatriates headed by Mr Haitham Jummaa.
Article 12 puts the WLCU under the authority of the Lebanese government and it is a method in the hand of Mr Jumaa, or whoever is the director of the expatriate’s department in the Lebanese government, to control the WLCU.
Article 12 also gives the said director the right to refuse any WLCU official, and or to appoint any official preferred by the director.
Article 12, if adopted, contradicts the constitution of the WLCU by making it a governmental organisation, and jeopardises its association with the United Nation.
We urge Minister Basil to take in consideration this very serious issue as it is the main, if not the only, obstacle that stand against such unification.
We urge all the members, branches and officials of the WLCU to support us by demanding the abolishment of article 12 prior to any unification.
We conclude by reminding everyone that we fully support the unity of the WLCU but with its full independence and strictly non-governmental, non-political, no-sectarian with good relationship with the Lebanese government.
The abolition of article 12 is a precondition to a true and genuine unification of WLCU:::
Read original article in Arabic
Open letter to H.E. Minister Gibran Bassil, Lebanese Minister of foreign affairs.