On the wall of the small living room, in Sin El-Fil, in the eastern suburbs of Beirut, photos of smiling children recall the happy days. But a psalmody of the Koran rises from the stereo and it is dressed in black that the Abi Haidar family receives its visitors.
Wednesday, December 4, Dany, 39, father of three children, crushed with debts, gave himself death. Returning early from work, he grabbed his rifle, isolated himself on a piece of terrace at the top of the building and shot himself in the head. An employee of a lighting company, he could no longer provide for his family and his parents, who live in the same cramped apartment.
"It had been several months since we felt it under pressure, says his mother, Khadra, eyes off. Everything became expensive in Lebanon, his salary was not enough. " "He was suffocated by financial responsibilities, he is a martyr of injustice, accuses Mohamed Dib, his father-in-law, his throat tight. Not a politician came forward after his death. I suppose that, for them, the suicide of citizens is irrelevant. "
In recent days, four other residents of the country of Cedar, overwhelmed by similar financial difficulties, have ended their days. In particular, a 40-year-old stonemason was hanged on 1st December, near his home in Ersal, in the Bekaa plain. According to the local press, it is the fact of being unable to give his daughter the 1,000 pounds (0.60 euro) needed to buy a thyme pancake, which pushed the man to commit the 'irreparable.
"Liquidity crisis"
These gestures of despair testify to the rampant impoverishment that strikes Lebanon. The phenomenon, one of the drivers of the ongoing protest movement, which led to the resignation in late October of the government of Saad Al-Hariri, is not new. It began in the mid-2010s, due to the collapse of tourism, the decline of bank transfers from the diaspora, the influx of Syrian refugees and the inability of the ruling class, gnawed through corruption, to face this new situation.
The number of jobs lost is estimated by investigators at 160 000, for a country of 6 million inhabitants
But the deterioration of the living conditions of the Lebanese suddenly accelerated at the end of the summer, a few weeks before the beginning of the demonstrations. Fearing that rumors of devaluation of the Lebanese pound would lead to a rush on the windows, banks began to limit access to the dollar, pillar of transactions in Lebanon. A de facto control of the capital has taken hold, marked by severe obstacles to the transfer of money abroad – except for the import of oil, flour and medicines – and a ceiling of withdrawals to a few hundred dollars per week.
