The legal expert of Maharat Mr. Tony Mikhael, together with the MP Ghassan Moukheiber completed the print media law document and it is now ready to be discussed with the project stakeholders and the Lebanese parliament.

At the start of the project, Maharat had two options to lobby for the amendment of the print media law; either submit it as a basket of amendments or register it as a new media law in the Lebanese parliament. Maharat lobbied and emphasized the need to organize a meeting with the communication and information committee at the Lebanese parliament to initiate the discussion of the new media law between parliament members.

On 10/6/2010 a meeting was conducted with the communication and information committee at 11.00 in the presence of the head of the committee the MP Hassan Fadlalla and the other parliament members in addition to the Minister of information, the president of the justice and administration committee Robert Ghanem, and the head of the journalism syndicate and the dean of faculty of media at the Lebanese University and Tony Mikhael from Maharat foundation.

The aim of the meeting was for each party to express their vision of the media law reform and discuss it with the present stakeholders.

During this meeting, it was revealed that the direction of the Minister of Information, the head of the communication and information committee and the head of the syndicate of journalism is to develop a new press law under which all print, audiovisual and electronic media falls. Consequently, Maharat decided to modify its document to include the print, audiovisual and electronic law since this falls within its ultimate objective to reform the whole media law.

After finalizing the document as mentioned above, in a way that it would be like a common trunk for all media, means general provisions, four meetings were conducted during July with many stakeholders. The meetings were held respectively on 7, 14, 15 and 20 July in the parliament, in the presence of MP Moukhaiber, Maharat's legal expert Tony Mikhael, media representatives (audiovisual, printed, electronic), legal experts, the dean of the faculty of Media, Media Catholic Union, UCIP, UNESCO, Human Rights Watch, representatives of both journalism syndicate and editors syndicate, Press club and the secretary and MP member of parliament committee of information and communication.

The meetings aimed at discussing the vision of the above stakeholders regarding media law       reform in order to come out with a consensus on how this law should be reformed before registering it at the parliament to be included and discussed.

All concerned attendees were with the idea of putting another law on the table to confront the inconvenient Robert Ghanem's law currently in discussion, and they expressed their will to adopt Maharat's law after discussions that will be prolonged due to the closure of the parliament for two months.

 Many remarks were valuable to the reform like including text messages in the law, some details in electronic media, registration of the outlet depending on the founder legal nature, the continuity of the prints in case of death and other issues about foreign publications and definition of chief director holding responsibility. Despite the agreement on many points after discussions, especially the cancellation of precautionary arrest, the debate is still running about the jail penalty and the defamation concerning the president of the republic. 

 Moreover, the meetings revealed one of the challenges that Maharat will face during its work on this campaign; the different visions of stakeholders regarding the media law reform. Consequently, Maharat will have build consensus on the present views in order to come up with a final document acceptable from all.

Maharat is also aware that registration of the law will be taken further due to the intention of the meetings attendees to slow down and take more time in discussions especially that there is no more need to urge because the parliament will be closed for two months starting the first of august.  However, Maharat will keep on following up as much as possible with the concerned people even if it would be outside the parliament.