Tucked into the mountains of the Jbeil district, Lasa town has been in the limelight for years now as illegal quarries over land ownership are still ongoing. Strenuous and intensified efforts have been recently exerted to bring this contentious, thorny issue to an end. Consequently, the minister of interior announced Tuesday that a final surveying of land, mostly owned by the Maronite Church, would resume in order to clench the case.
In fact, a land surface equaling to 3636 thousand square meters owned by the Jounieh Maronite diocese has been usurped both directly and indirectly. According to a map set in 1939, the Maronite archdiocesan owns around 5 million square meters of land tantamount to 95 real properties including established buildings and churches, as well as galactic agricultural and wooded lands.
Beside lands owned by the Maronite Church, other immense real properties belong to more than 300 Maronites who hail from Lasa. Unfortunately, most of these have been also illegally seized.
One week ago, Maronite Patriarch Bechara al-Rahi had urged caretaker Interior Minister Marwan Charbel to revitalize this case, asking him to prepare the ground for a final surveying of land. Accordingly, Charbel held a meeting at his office with representatives of each of Speaker Nabih Berri and the Maronite Patriarchate, as well as secretary-general of the Higher Islamic Council and Lasa’s mayor.
During the meeting, a relevant roadmap was set while the implementation mechanism is yet to garner consent. Moreover, the minister had pinpointed both the demarcation of boundaries and determination of properties as a must. As he noted that it’s no longer allowed to prevent official authorities from carrying out the surveying, Charbel advised those who have any objection to bring their case before the judiciary.
While the Maronite Patriarchate gave its consent, others, as usual, failed to approve on Charbel’s plan as they voiced concern over the legal standard which the surveying will be based on. In this regard, the minister stressed that the demarcation process shall be carried out with consideration of relevant regulations and laws (noting that the 1939 demarcation map is deemed the sole relevant legal document).
The surveying process is set to kick off, as agreed, on the 1st of November at the most.
