The General Directorate of Finance

The General Directorate of Finance is the biggest administration within the Ministry of Finance in Lebanon. It employs about three thousand civil servants, contractual and other staff, within nine directorates and seven local departments in each Mohafazat (district), in addition to an office in each Qadaa (county). The General Directorate is in charge of the government’s budget (preparation, execution, and control), the government’s expenditures, the Treasury, public debt management, public accounting, the financial supervision of state-owned enterprises, administrative affairs (HR, training, logistics, accounting), information technology (systems, development and maintenance), and various taxes, including VAT.

As Director General of the General Directorate of Finance, Alain Bifani is responsible for managing the administration and the related directorates.

Alain Bifani has held this position since 2000. During his term, Bifani has introduced the Value-Added Tax, the tax on perceived interests, passed the tax procedure code, and developed e-taxation, e-declaration and e-payment.

Under Bifani’s leadership, the administration was restructured to incorporate, among others, a debt management directorate, a new budget directorate, and new units in charge of macroeconomic policies, tax policies, and cash management.

The administration is computerized, and tax units are now reorganized by functions, thus increasing productivity at all levels.

Alain Bifani is known for having successfully led a big number of major tasks, including the tax transparency program and the end of banking secrecy for non-residents, the response plan to the Syrian refugees’ crisis, the introduction of petroleum laws and regulations, Lebanon’s EBRD membership, and the complete reconstruction and audit of Lebanon’s financial accounts, providing his country with the first ever reliable set of financial accounts for the years 1993-2018.

Finally, Bifani is well-known for his relentless and loud fight against corruption.

New 2014 — Alain Bifani speaks to the media about the 1993-2014 financial accounts’ reconstitution. Major achievement after 4 years of hard work.

New 2010 — Alain Bifani (L) shakes hands with Carlos Slim Helu (R) during his visit to Lebanon in March 2010, to discuss opportunities with the diaspora.

New 2009 — Alain Bifani (L) meets President Väclav Klaus of the Czech Republic (R) to discuss world economics, following a speech promoting Lebanon at the Comenius conference in Prague in 2009.