Lebanon takes back decision to delay daylight savings time

Lebanon's caretaker prime minister said on Monday (March 27) that the government has reversed the decision to delay daylight savings time and that the clocks will move one hour ahead on Wednesday (March 29) night. The decision to delay daylight savings time had created deep divisions in the country and even threatened to take sectarian turn.

Prime Minister Najib Mikati said that the cabinet had decided to reverse the earlier decision after a "calm discussion" and that the state needed 48 hours to re-adjust their operations.

Mikati angered many Lebanese when he decided last Thursday not to start daylight savings time over the last weekend of March when it usually does but instead to roll clocks forward a month later on April 20.

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That decision came after a meeting with Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri in which Berri asked him to postpone the time switch, according to footage of the meeting seen by Reuters.

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The earlier decision was seen as an attempt to score points with Muslims who would have ended their Ramzan fast an hour earlier by delaying daylight savings time.

But the move was defied by Lebanon's top Christian authority as well as some schools, media outlets and businesses, which rolled their clocks forward on Saturday night.

Mikati even faced objections from within cabinet, including the justice minister who said Lebanon had more important challenges to focus on.

The country has been without a president for five months and a protracted financial crisis has brought most public institutions to a standstill.

(With inputs from agencies)

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