BEIRUT: Lebanon’s parliament failed yesterday to elect a president, for a second time in a week, raising fears the post will remain vacant amid tensions over neighbouring war-torn Syria.
The Hezbollah bloc refused to attend yesterday’s session, ensuring parliament was left without the quorum needed to vote for a successor to incumbent President Michel Sleiman.
Parliament Speaker “Nabih Berri has set ... May 7 as a new date to hold a parliamentary session, given the lack of quorum on Wednesday”, the National News Agency reported. Deputies are faced with a choice between Samir Geagea, a fierce opponent of the Syrian government and its ally Hezbollah, and Michel Aoun, who is backed by the Lebanese Shia movement.
The animosity between the rival Christian leaders dates back to the civil war that ravaged Lebanon from 1975 to 1990. Sleiman’s term expires on May 25 and parliament has until then to elect a successor. If it fails to do so, the government will assume all executive powers, a scenario Lebanon experienced in 1988 and in 2007.
Over the years, the choice of president in Lebanon has been dictated by foreign powers, particularly Syria, which dominated the Mediterranean country for nearly three decades.
Despite the withdrawal of its troops from Lebanon in 2005 and its own three-year conflict, Syria still has a say in Lebanon, largely through Hezbollah, whose forces have been fighting alongside those of the Damascus regime.
Hezbollah’s arsenal and its involvement in the Syrian war are the main bones of contention between Lebanon’s rival political camps supported by Damascus and Tehran on one side and Riyadh and Washington on the other.
AFP
