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Such an audit is on a list of reforms that donors have demanded
before helping Lebanon climb out of a financial crisis that has
locked most savers out of dollar-denominated bank accounts and
left four in five Lebanese poor, according to UN agencies. These
reforms include steps to tackle corruption, a root cause of the
meltdown that has crashed the currency and triggered a sovereign
default.
The Lebanese parliament adopted a law in December 2020 that
lifts banking secrecy in regard to the central bank audit for
one year. The law expired at the end of last year.
MP Ibrahim Kanaan, head of parliament's finance committee, said
the law had now been extended until the completion of the audit.
"This law puts the forensic audit on the final track," Kanaan
said in televised remarks.
Restructuring consultancy Alvarez & Marsal (A&M), which the
Lebanese government has hired to carry out the audit, initially
withdrew in November 2020 saying it had not received the
information it required. A second contract was signed in
September 2021, but the audit has not yet commenced amid
requests by A&M for more information from the central bank.
A central bank spokesperson told Reuters earlier this month that
the central bank had provided "all info" and urged A&M to
commence.
(Reporting by Mahmoud Mourad; Writing by Timour Azhari; Editing
by Gareth Jones and Alex Richardson)
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