Status quo victory
Thursday, 18 June 2009 19:28
Omayma Abdel-Latif
Two of the rules that have come to define Lebanese politics during the past three decades were given a new lease of life by the outcome of Sunday's polls. Rule number one is that there is no victor and no vanquished in the never-ending struggle over Lebanon's identity. No force has been defeated in any existential sense. The elections have merely given a new mandate to a majority that was already there. Second is that confessional politics has emerged yet again as the mover and shaker, motivating hundreds of thousands of Lebanese voters (the turnout is estimated to have been 1,495,000 of a total 3,275,000 registered voters) to storm the ballot boxes. The Interior Ministry has announced voter turnout reached 54.8 per cent.Figures aside, the public debate moved quickly to address crucial questions regarding the formation of the new cabinet, its make-up, what role the president should play, whether the opposition be granted a blocking third and, most importantly, whether Lebanon now needs a new Doha agreement.
The first Doha agreement, reached in May 2008, ended 18 months of political deadlock. It gave the Lebanese a new president and a national unity government, with a blocking third of seats allocated to the opposition alliance headed by Hizbullah and Christian leader Michel Aoun. This agreement expired on 8 June, or so argues the Western-backed old/new majority of the March 14 alliance.
While both the opposition and majority are speaking the language of national reconciliation, forming a new government constitutes the first challenge to their commitment to unity
While both the opposition and majority are speaking the language of national reconciliation, forming a new government constitutes the first challenge to their commitment to unity
Two weeks from now, on 22 June, ministerial consultations to pick a new prime minister are scheduled to begin, with Saad Al-Hariri, head of Future Movement and majority leader, currently the most likely candidate, unless he is vetoed by the Saudis. Before this the new parliament will elect its speaker. The only candidate so far is the present incumbent, Nabih Berri, who has the backing of Hizbullah and Jumblatt. Al-Hariri has said he will not veto the re- election of Berri.
Several scenarios are being floated as to the make-up of the new government. Either the president takes the blocking third in cabinet, or he shares this third with the opposition. The blocking third is a mechanism which was first proposed by the opposition during the 18-month political deadlock that lasted from November 2006 to May 2008 when five Shia ministers quit the cabinet. The condition to return was to grant the opposition the right to veto any resolution passed by the majority in cabinet to end what they perceived was a monopoly of power by the March 14 forces. In the national unity government resulting from the Doha agreement, the opposition was granted that right.
Such a proposal has an inherent weakness: the president's credibility has been hurt by what the opposition claims was his meddling in the election in favour of March 14. Suleiman is accused of backing a list that included March 14 candidates in his hometown Jbeil and in Kesrwan. The president flatly denies the charges but the opposition may still reject the president becoming the effective mediator between it and the majority. In a televised speech on Monday Hizbullah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah said "consultations among opposition figures" were underway to reach a consensus over whether or not the opposition -- on top of which is its strong Christian leader Michel Aoun -- will participate, and under what conditions.
While there are fears that if the opposition and majority fail to reach an agreement over a national unity government the country might enter into a period similar to that experienced from November 2006 till May 2008, when all state institutions were paralysed, most observers point out that the regional context has changed dramatically. Syria and Saudi Arabia, the two regional players with most influence in Lebanon, are engaged in reconciliation talks. There is also the possibility for US-Iran dialogue. Lebanon, hypersensitive to regional and international developments, has been positively affected.
Hizbullah's arms may have been among the most contentious issues raised during the election campaign but they are likely to remain outside of any post-election debate. Al-Hariri has stressed that the issue of Hizbullah's arms should "remain outside the media debate and be addressed in the national dialogue". This was interpreted as a conciliatory gesture by the majority leader to calm Hizbullah fears.
While the bickering over the new government will be drawn out, it is unlikely that it will reach an impasse akin to that of the past four years. "It will be good political horse trading," said one observer.
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