Gangs of Lebanon send native talent towards the exit

Beirut has the mild stench of decay, and it is no coincidence that three retail units have recently closed at the top of my street, writes Michael Karam.

Beirut has the mild stench of decay, and it is no coincidence that three retail units have recently closed at the top of my street, the last being the rather convenient HSBC Premier branch that had been open for less than two years.

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Ironically, within spitting distance of all three is Sama Beirut, the luxury 50-storey apartment building that will practically block out the sun when it is completed. I say ironically because construction is the only business that seems to be moving in Lebanon, even if the state can't match it with the necessary infrastructure.

The rest of business, on the back of a bad tourist summer and regional turmoil, is putting on a brave face as the rating agencies slash the growth rates they predicted earlier in the year. The scary thing is that no one seems to be doing much about it; neither the government, which should be busy drawing up action plans to resuscitate the private sector, nor Lebanon's deposit-heavy banking sector, which should be looking at clever ways to "use" all that money.

"You're right, there is absolutely no vision, but that's not the whole story," says an ex-senior banker — let's call him George —turned consultant. "There is poor corporate governance, thin management and incompetence. That about sums up the Lebanese banking sector."

George left banking a few months ago after his employers had consistently failed to "diversify activity" because of what he called "short-sighted conservatism".

Now he sat across from me in a Beirut restaurant in a navy blue polo shirt instead of the usual city banker look he had finessed over years spent in Europe.

"Simply, they are not acting as banks. They are living on deposits and buying T-bills. Corporate lending is weak and they are not offering fixed-income products. Lebanon has a loans-to-deposit ratio of 30 per cent. It's absurd. There is no room for personal initiative. It's all very one-dimensional and it's not creating any value for the economy."

By now George was in his stride, disgusted at the sector to which he had given his best years, but which he says has no respect for initiative. Those who got ahead, he said, were senior managers living in fear of the chairman and his children and who protect themselves by surrounding themselves with yes-men. "Merchant banking, including venture capital and private equity, is the name of the game and they want nothing to do with it," he bemoaned. "They are not looking for ways to make retail banking cheaper and in doing this they are abusing the role the sector should play, especially a sector that is such a key component of the economy."

George leant across the table: "Bottom line, Lebanon is a country of gangs. There is the banking clique, but there is also the government's public-sector gang, and both are encouraging a brain drain. There is no place for talent in Lebanese institutions, public or private."

The rambling accusations of a disgruntled ex-employee or a lucid, albeit impassioned, description, of a sector and country that has no idea where it is going? The government is in a mess and divided. In one corner sit the prime minister, Najib Mikati, who is trying his best to lead the nation and stay a Sunni leader, and Michel Suleiman, the president and figurehead of the republic. In the other is Hizbollah, with nothing to do except play out a regional agenda for Iran and Syria, and its allies in the Free Patriotic Movement led by the Christian Michel Aoun who, it appears, will throw in his lot with anyone who will lead him to the presidency.

"I mean, where are the really talented people in the public sector?" George asked. "Are you telling me that Lebanon's economic problems are so intricate? If so, why don't we try to recruit the cream of our graduates to work in the public sector? We don't, but to be perfectly honest we could get Lebanon's economy back on track after a two-hour working lunch; the issues at hand are not that complex."

By now George was getting quite agitated. His was the look of someone who knew it was either leave and go back to Europe, where life threw up different stresses, or accept the madness that is Lebanon. "Take our gold reserves. We have the 15th-biggest reserves in the world and possibly the biggest per capita. We have 9.22 million ounces and by my calculation that gives us a minimum of US$14 billion (Dh51.42bn) in gold. The state could easily sell $600 million of that and create two funds, one to help the unemployed and those living on the breadline, a social welfare fund if you like, and another, a sovereign wealth fund, to create private initiatives. But what do we do? Nothing."

George paused. "Then again. I suppose even if we did, it would probably fail because the wrong people, political appointees, would be hired to manage these funds. What's the point of having ideas if none can be implemented?"

A Michael Karam is a freelance writer and communication consultant based in Beirut.