Pour mémoire : discussion sur le scandale de la construction du siège de Courant Patriotique Libre à proximité du site archéologique et ô combien symbolique de Nahr Al Kalb, #Liban
Antoine Atallah - Some thoughts about the Nahr el-Kalb scandal...
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Antoine Atallah
Hier, à 14:14 ·
Some thoughts about the Nahr el-Kalb scandal
There is first, an archaeological argument to hold. The reason why the stelae were carved in that location precisely, across thousands of years of history, is the nature of the landscape itself. It is because the promontory of Nahr el-Kalb was so difficult to cross that the conquerors who succeeded saw it as a feat and exploit and chose to systematically commemorate their passage. Landscape and stelae are intrinsically linked. Damaging the geology, (even more than it already is because of the highway and the illegal war-time quarries located behind the site) means damaging the sacred landscape to which the stelae belong. It means taking away part of their potency.
Some will say that there’s nothing illegal in building on that site. That might well be very true. However, we all know how either inexistant, weak or unfit heritage laws and regulations are in Lebanon. How inefficient they are made to be, on purpose. How easy it is to bypass them anyways with the right contacts and leverage. So, the legal argument is irrelevant. When there is no state and no law to guide our choices and decisions, it is rather a question of personal responsibility that is at play. One should assess, as objectively as possible, what is in the public’s best interest. What is the best things to do for the collective. One needs to call upon their sensibility and intelligence. Clearly, neither assessment, nor responsability, nor sensibility were ever present in the decision-making process.
Furthermore, if there was indeed a deficit of sensibility to landscape and history, the decision-makers could at least have been made aware by the fact that the site is classified as a Unesco World Memory site since 2005. That the Lebanese state placed the site in 1996 on the Unesco World Heritage tentative list and confirmed that status in 2019, which means Lebanon ambitions to place Nahr el-Kalb on the World Heritage List in the coming years... and that such major works a few meters away from the Roman road and its stelae would permanently destroy that hope. The Tayyar leadership did not think one bit about all of these parameters. Ignorance? Lack of sensibility? Recklessness? Negligence?
Unless none of this is true and the Tayyar leadership made it a point to place their HQ precisely there. Which raises the question of the symbolic reach of such a gesture. Every conqueror who went through Lebanon commemorated his passage and conquest by carving a stela at Nahr el-Kalb. By positioning its headquarter on top of the tens of stelae added across millennia, is the Tayyar considering itself a « conqueror »? Is it celebrating a « conquest »? Is it considering itself equal to Ramses II, Nabuchodonosor, Caracalla, and Napoléon? What does this imposition, this symbolic appropriation and privatisation of a site and history that belong to all Lebanese, actually mean? It would in any case be consistent with the Tayyar’s aggressive, arrogant and self-righteous discourse.
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A noter les réponses de Jad Tabet :
Jad Tabet
Dear Antoine
Au delà du débat stérile sur la conformité ou la non conformité du projet avec la législation libanaise, la question symbolique est essentielle. Le projet a été présenté au Conseil supérieur de l’urbanisme comme étant un projet de centre culturel proposé par les moines maronites propriétaires du terrain. Étant présent à la réunion du Conseil plusieurs membres se sont étonné de la taille du projet et demande qu’il soit transmis à la Direction des Antiquités pour avoir leur avis étant donné sa position par rapport au site. La DGA semble avoir négocié pour que le projet soit reculé d’une vingtaine de mètres par rapport à la clôture qui constitue la zone de protection légale du site (50 mètres !!!!) et a donné par la suite son accord. J’ai envoyé moi-même une alerte au centre du patrimoine mondial leur demandant d’intervenir auprès de la DGA pour avoir les plans du projet mais il semble que ça n’a rien donné. Maintenant que nous savons qu’il ne s’agit pas d’un « centre culturel » mais du siège d’un parti j’espère que la mobilisation permettra de délocaliser le projet ou du moins de le modifier pour réduire son échelle.
et encore
Jad Tabet Aline Chahine Maya Chams Ibrahimchah
I think I have to explain my position as member of the Higher Council of Urban Planning. Since I became member of this council in my quality of president of the Order of Engineers an Architects, I have always insisted on the necessity to apply urban regulations without any compromise and prevent any interpretation which would be to the benefit of specific persons or entities. When I consider that certain urban rules and regulations area not satisfactory I try to convince the majority of the council to modify them.
The Nahr el kalb project was presented to the Council as a cultural touristic center to be built by the Maronite Church. The program seemed compatible with the archaeological zone and the project respected the urban regulations in force in the area . The Higher council of urban planning had several years ago proposed to modify the zoning in order to reinforce the protection of the valley but the proposal was not accepted and became obsolete due to a decision of the constitutional council (majlis shoura el dawla). The Higher council decided to send the project to the DGA at the ministry of culture. Since the project was outside the legal protection zone of the archaeological site, the DGA approved the project after introducing some modifications and sent it back to the Higher Council. Hence I could not oppose a project that was in conformity with the regulations even if I was convinced that it’s scale would harm the integrity of the site.
One should be consistent: when you fight to impose the respect of urban regulations and against any infringement, you cannot oppose a project which respects these regulations.Following this case and other similar cases, the Higher Council of Urban planning took last year a series of decisions to modify urban regulations in sensitive zones in order to introduce stronger protection. But these decision are valid only 3 years and become obsolete if they are not adopted in a décret by the Council of Ministers......
To make the story short, I discovered that the so called cultural and touristic center was in fact the HQ of the FMP only when they got the permit registered at the Order of Engineers and Architects in Tripoli and that the issue was made public in the media. I contacted UNESCO World Heritage center to inform them but I don’t know if they ever reacted.
I want also to confirm what Bass Tb said about the role of the Order of Engineers and Architects: we have NO authority whatsoever to reject the registration of any permit since the control of the compliance of a permit with the law is of the sole authority of the DGU and municipalities. As for the protection of Heritage the relevant authority is the DGA at the ministry of culture. The role of the Order is only to constitute a pressure group (groupe de pression) to push for legislative and organizational measures that would enhance the living environment.