Let’s talk about that explosion.
It was late afternoon in Beirut.
People were watching a huge fire take hold in the port.
But no one expected this.
Two days after the disaster
more than 135 people have died.
We may never know the real number.
Ambulances continue to arrive at the scene of the explosion.
Thousands were injured.
Beirut's governor says more than 300,000 people are now homeless.
So what do we know about why this happened?
What is it about Lebanon that makes this so much worse?
And how will a country that's almost bankrupt ever rebuild?
Lebanon was already on its knees.
Debt, poverty, conflict, a paralysed government
corruption, money that's almost worthless. And then this.
"Everyone has a story of survival and tragedy."
It's hard to make sense of the devastation.
But this is what the port area used to look like.
It's surrounded by people's homes.
And that's the warehouse by the water where nearly
3,000 tonnes of ammonium nitrate were being stored.
The chemical is a common fertilizer and you can use it to make explosives.
That's what a bomber did in Oklahoma City in 1995.
The fertilizer arrived at the port on a vessel
that was having technical problems.
It was then reportedly impounded.
Over the years, requests to do something about it
either by selling it locally or exporting it
were apparently sent to the courts.
But nothing happened.
And now they're trying to figure out who's responsible for the explosion.
The president of Lebanon says an investigation into the Beirut port explosion
will look at whether it was caused by negligence, an accident, or possible external interference.
People in Lebanon also want answers.
People are in shock but anger is also growing at a political class
many blame for mismanagement and being responsible for running the economy into the ground.
It's an economic crisis made much worse by a pandemic and lockdowns.
But they were protesting long before COVID-19.
To understand what's behind Lebanon's economic and political crisis
here's part of our explainer from back in February.
Protesters say they're fed up with a lot of things:
the economy, high taxes, lack of jobs, crumbling infrastructure
and they say the biggest problem is rampant corruption whoch has thrived
under Lebanon's sectarian political system.
We're going to explain that system in a second - but let's get a sense
of just how tough everyday life is for most Lebanese people.
We don't really have access to proper public services.
Like there's no 24/7 electricity, there is no clean, accessible drinking water.
You have piles of garbage all over the country.
Sewage is not treated. It goes straight out into the ocean.
So it feels like the state is absent from daily life in Lebanon.
Most people agree that mess is caused by serious mismanagement.
Some say it's because of corruption.
But you'll also hear analysts say that Lebanon never really recovered from a long and devastating war.
We’re talking about Lebanon’s civil war which started in 1975 and went on for 15 years.
Militias from different sects and political groups fought each other for dominance, and also fought among themselves.
Then Syria and Israel got involved, and the battles became even more destructive.
At the end of the war, Lebanon’s main political groups signed the Taif Agreement
to make sure they all got a slice of political power.
And that’s really the basis for Lebanon’s political system today.
A Maronite Christian gets the presidency, the prime minister has to be Sunni Muslim,
and the speaker of parliament is always a Shia Muslim.
In Parliament, seats are shared 50/50 - between Muslims and Christians.
But in reality, there are two big political alliances which include parties
from different sects, and they each have rival foreign powers backing them.
March 14 was former Prime Minister Saad Hariri’s bloc, which has the support of Saudi Arabia and the US.
March 8 is the bloc that includes the Maronite Christian President Michel Aoun’s party and Hezbollah.
It has Syria and Iran’s support.
So because of all those overlapping and competing interests,
many people will tell you that Lebanon’s sectarian political system isn’t really sectarian.
What's really happening in Lebanon is that there are political parties that used to be militias.
Sects are not fighting in Lebanon. It's really opposing warlords backed by opposing foreign powers.
And this is how - many say - corruption has gotten so out of hand.
Many of those powerful political leaders - or the Zuama as they’re called in Lebanon - are said to have focused
on their own political and financial gains and made themselves very rich.
Lebanon has 220 kilometres of coast. 180 kilometres of the coast has been privatized.
It's now under the control of either former officials and people who are close to them.
I'll just give you one example of parking meters in Beirut. The revenues were not going to the state.
They were going to a private company controlled owned by people who are close to politicians.
There have been no real signs of change since then.
And how the port is allowed to run is seen as a big part of the problem.
In his coverage of the explosion our Beirut correspondent put it this way:
“It is also not lost on Beirut's residents that this tragedy emanated from the city's port
a public utility known locally as the Cave of Ali Baba and the 40 Thieves.
He talks about allegations of bribes — and billions of dollars in tax revenue from the port disappearing.
And since the pandemic things have gone from bad to worse.
The government is nearly bankrupt.
Lebanon already had the world’s third-highest level of debt relative to its GDP.
Its currency, the lira, has lost 85% of its value against the dollar.
And inflation is rising by more than 50% a month. Food has become unaffordable for so many people.
Back in January people had hoped a new government would improve things.
Their main goal this year was to push through reforms to qualify for international aid.
But the politicians haven’t been able to agree and talks with the International Monetary Fund are on hold.
It's not anger for the sake of anger. It's not an impossibility to have in Lebanon
competent people to govern and to serve their people.
Let there be accountability. Let's have a transparent investigation.
Right now people in Lebanon are asking themselves how in the world the country is ever going to recover.
Who’s going to rebuild Beirut?
And where’s the money going to come from to pay for an estimated $15BN worth of damage?
How is its health system going to treat thousands of injured people
and people sick with COVID-19 after at least three hospitals have been destroyed?
And where is a country that’s almost entirely reliant on imports from the sea
going to get food from when its port is a crater?
Even before the explosion politicians in Lebanon couldn’t find common ground.
So now something and someone’s gotta give to stand any chance of sorting out this mess.
Because you can only push people so far.