Remarks by Walid Maalouf - LARP IV Mission & Conference
Friday, September 1, 2107
LARP is a bridge between Lebanon's business community and its counterpart in North, Central and South America. Since our inception we strive:
1. To strengthen the bridge between business men and women in Lebanon and the Lebanese American businesses in the Americas
2. To introduce to the Lebanese people the individual successes of our immigrant businesses and political leaders
3. To support philanthropic projects. Throughout our last three missions we have donated in cash more than $160,000 to worthy cause in the private and public sectors
We have established LARP Lebanon that is registered in the ministry of interior as a non-profit organization to facilitate the implementation of these goals and discuss issues of most concern in the daily lives of Lebanese citizens, hoping to bring the attention necessary for improvement. Therefore we will discuss today three crises the Lebanese are facing: 1. The Syrian refugee crisis and its infrastructure challenges; 2. The Waste Management Crisis; and the Energy & Water Crisis.
Our theme this year is Solidarity with Lebanon – Reform, Security & Stability"
On the Security & Stability front:
In order to have true security & stability Lebanon urgently requires a long-term security and stability plan; therefore, we hope the Lebanese Leadership will advocate the immediate safe return of 1.5 million displaced Syrians, finding alternatives for Palestinian refugees based on UN resolutions and Arab Peace Initiative, and seal the Lebanese boarders all around its sovereign territory. Furthermore; we urge the implementation of UNSCR 1559; 1701, the declaration of Babdaa and the neutrality of Lebanon.
In this recent military operation that the Lebanese army is undertaking it has thus far achieved the liberation of the northern boarders, we must implement this long term strategy or we will go back to square one. I want to take this opportunity to commend and thank the Lebanese Army for cleaning up the northern boarders from the Assad henchmen and ISIS which he created.
On the reform front:
Lebanese are in dire need of full reform in all of the country’s institutions including ministries, security forces, and infrastructure. We call for a total clean-up of the Ministry of Finance and all its subsidiaries; Reform and automation in the judicial and security system all over Lebanon; Update the Lebanese constitution to catch up with the advancement around the world and make Lebanon a modern State; The enactment of an electoral law as one man one vote.
The émigré community has the expertise, the know-how and the means to help achieve these milestones on reform, security and stability. LARP position paper is available in your folders for anyone who would like to read in more details our recommendations and the study of the building of the boarder’s security wall.
Each year LARP chooses from our successful immigrant community a business leader and a life time achiever. We are so proud to have this year our Corporate Leaders Ambassador Al Cardenas and the life time achiever Secretary Ray LaHood.
Introducing Al Cardenas
I have known Al since April 2015 at the Jeb Bush top 250 supporters in Miami.
Al (Alberto R.) Cardenas was born in Cuba in 1948 from a Lebanese mother and a Cuban father. He is nationally recognized for his leadership in the law, business, diplomacy and politics. He has served as an adviser to US Presidents.
With all his successes, Al is proud of his Lebanese heritage which he learned from his mother Edith whose family migrated from Ghazir, district of Keserwan. Her parents are Mansur Daou and Nallive Raee who arrived in Cuba from the town of Ghazir in Lebanon in the 1910s with five sisters and settled in a small agricultural town called Puerto Padre in the Easternmost province of Cuba.
For most of his young life, they all lived in the same home. The family moved to America together in the summer of 1960. His Lebanese grandparents died in the United States and his mother died last year at the age of 94.
This is his very first trip to Lebanon and on tomorrow morning Al and the LARP delegation will join him to visit his forefather’s town of Ghazi which we are all looking forward to it.
Introducing Edward White
Welcome Mr. Edward White to Lebanon, I am glad that you are able to join us today. Ed assumed his duties as the Deputy Chief of Mission at the U.S. Embassy in Beirut in August 2017.He is a career diplomat, served Syria in the State Department's Office of Levant Affair; at the U.S. Mission to NATO in Brussels, in Baghdad, Cairo, Damascus, and Caracas. He is a graduate of the National Defense University's Eisenhower School; a graduate of the University of Georgia School of Law; and the University of Notre Dame. Ed also served for four years as a U.S. Army officer.
Introducing the representative of the President of the Council of Minister Deputy Basem Shabb
His Excellency Basem Shabb is a member of the Lebanese Parliament since 2005; and a member of the Future Party; he serves on the Defense and Interior Committees and since 2009 on the Economics Committee; since 2013 he serves on the Human Rights Committee. He received his medical degree from the American University of Beirut in 1982; he did his post graduate training in general and cardiac surgery at the University of Texas in Galveston. He is also members of the Global Organization of Parliamentarians against corruption; member of the executive committee of the Supreme Council of Evangelical Churches; and founding members of the Lebanese Association of Biosafety, Biosecurity and Bioethics since 1024.
Introducing Ray LaHood
I have known Ray since 1993 on his first campaign for congress in Washington DC.
Ray LaHood is the former US Department of Transportation Secretary from 2009 to 2013, Secretary LaHood served from 1995 to 2009 in the US House of Representatives on behalf of the 18th District of Illinois and served on various House committees, among them the powerful House Appropriations Committee and the House Intelligence Committee, with a 36-year career in public service. His grandfather Sam LaHood Beshara immigrated to the United States in 1895 from the northern town of Aito and yesterday Aito honored Ray in naming the main highway that crosses the town in his name the Ray LaHood Boulevard. Let see this clip from the yesterday welcome in Aito and the Ray the floor is yours.
