MTV shared yesterday a chart that showed the Ministry of Public Works spending by area, in order to “prove” that Christians areas are barely receiving 18% of the total expenditure. They picked cities that have a Shiite majority (Baalbeck, Hermel, Nabatieh, Bent Jbeil) and compared them to areas of Christian majority like Matn, Jbeil, Jezzine, Zahle and Bcharreh.
I am not really sure what they were trying to prove, but they failed miserably because what matters here is how this money is being spent and not in which area. I currently live in Keserwan and I am more interested in knowing how these 3 billion Liras were spent because the roads are worse than ever and nothing has really changed in the past year or so. Corruption is the real problem in Lebanon and fueling sectarianism through such reports will only strengthen those who are in charge now.
More importantly, and I think this is the real scandal here, MTV were complaining about the lack of spending in Batroun yet they missed out on the fact that Batroun got almost twice as much as Tripoli, the most populous and poorest city in the north. (Thank you Mustapha for noticing that!)
[YouTube]
Just when I thought MTV couldn’t stoop to a lower level…
Medias are lacking content
man … shi biza3il 3anjad addeh l ta2ifiye feyte fina 3al ekhir . addeh sar report ta2ife aktar mn kelmet ta2ifiye . w 100% 7atta l manati2 li 2ekhde a3la ar2am … last month kent b b3albak mafiye khabrak l tor2at honik addeh zbele …
Shame
Looking at the data, the spending differences look very significant though. Do you have data on how the government allocates spending (by population, need…?) to help us evaluate MTVs argument and your argument better?
MTV, like any other local TV station, has an agenda to propagate. But that doesn’t make the numbers in the report false. There is a disproportionate allocation of money, but not just to Christians though.
Is it just me or doe Akaar look like they added a 3 and even forgot to add the apostrophe after the 3 million?? to make the figure look bigger