Mfm - the voice of right and truth

Now this is an interesting paradox. Mfm was just launched on June 1rst. Under the umbrella of the Michel el Murr media panoply. Yet, his other assets - namely Mtv and the newspaper Nida'a al Watan, are seeing massive licensing and salary cuts which has touched the news department (which before was judged untouchable), so currently news anchors and reporters have had their salaries cut to 60% of the original sum they used to earn before the 2019 financial crisis along with letting go of all producers and therefore letting the reporters themselves edit their own output. Reports also indicate the Nida'a al Watan only runs 200 units per day and had to let go some of its main analysts and writers.

So launching a political radio might seem an anomaly. But interestingly, Michel's brother, Jihad (spelled also Jyad here) started off the whole empire in 1979 at the tender age of 14 with RML (Radio-Mont Liban) a major radio station which also engulfed during different iterations Hit FM, NRJ, Nostalgie (some still existing, others not). So perhaps this is a full circle for the family, which mind you is embroiled in a legal dispute - which goes back and forth in the courts of law in Lebanon over, you guessed, the control of the media empire.

To go back to the Mfm well, they are launching with the selling line "the voice of the right and the truth" - which is much closer phonetically in Arabic. 

Murr Tower ad dating back to 1975

Ad cleaned and rearranged by Tarek Chemaly

And how about this time capsule of an ad.

The Murr Tower, which still stands empty and incomplete after all this time, was supposed to be - as per its ad which appeared in Annahar newspaper in 1975 - as "the first skyscraper of the Middle East" (interestingly, it was not the first skyscraper-inspired structure - look here), and the ad boasts its 40-storey high length. And that it is the highest building in Lebanon. 

The ad specifies that the first stage of construction of the first 20 floors started and finished within one month, and that the second one started on April 5 1975 and was supposed to finish "at the beginning of May" - the war that erupted on April 15th 1975 had other plans. The building included as per the ad 400 offices, a cinema, a restaurant and cafeteria, telex and telegraph center, a telephone for every office and other amenities which were high-end for its time.

If you wish to see the current inside of the tower, which was taken over by various militias over time (specifically during the war) please look at the fascinating images here. For a while there were plans to turn the tower into a fancy high-rise but these never materialized (here).

The tower still remains as a hollow, empty, and macabre reminder of a Beirut with a questionable past, and sadly, murky present and uncertain future.

Elections 2022: Michel el Murr, no, no, the other one.

So Michel El Murr is up for the elections. OK, I know this sounds confusing, but considering Michel El Murr was a fixture in Lebanese politics (until his influence dwindled, and he passed away), and seeing his son Elias did not want to carry the mantle (though he did for a while, and then he was severely wounded after an explosion targeted him), now comes the third generation - the "new" (not sure improved though) Michel El Murr. 

So voila, drowned in generics, the campaign does wink to all those who - for many, many, many years elected his grandfather (whose name he carries) with the line "in loyalty to the ones who were loyal" (considering his grandfather mentioned "the loyal Metn" - Metn being the region he is running in - several times in his campaigns), and "on board of loyalty, we progress and continue" (interestingly this is a name-play as "on board" in Arabic is "3ala metn" - ironically another list is using the same word play). 

All of this of course comes with no direct or visible program - but does he need one when he rides on such a name?