Democratisation in the Middle East - the debate

Actually.




Jesus was likely a leftie...in some ways. But, that's beside the point.

New start in Lebanon is slowed by old rules

By Hassan Fattah The New York Times
SATURDAY, MAY 28, 2005


BEIRUT Campaign banners dangled across Beirut streets and images of pensive candidates were plastered on walls throughout the city this week as Lebanon prepared for the start of parliamentary elections on Sunday.

Yet despite the trappings of an election, the one thing missing from this ballot vote has been campaigning itself.

Lebanon goes to the polls to elect a new Parliament free of Syrian interference. Beginning in Beirut, the elections will continue over four successive Sundays in different parts of the country to elect a new 128-member legislature that will choose a new cabinet and presumably begin to tackle Lebanon's major problems.

But after months of street rallies, international crises and political intrigue, the country's polls are proving an anticlimax for many here. The popular uprisings and the sense of a dramatic change have largely been overtaken by familiar politics and the sense that little may in fact have changed.

"It's very bewildering because it's not really an election this year," said Paul Salem, a onetime political analyst who is running for an orthodox seat in the town of Khoura. "If it was my district I would normally be running a campaign, but instead I have to convince the bosses that run the lists."

Save for a few singular campaign events held for select groups, there has been little effort to reach the average voter here, many candidates admit.

Instead, most campaigning has amounted to a series of backroom deals to tie up with lists that seek to pool votes for greatest effect. That has resulted in ironic twists in which alliances tie up in one town but stand opposed in others.

Lebanon's elections, like its politics, are a labyrinth of sectarian division and time-honored tradition. The 128-member Parliament is evenly split between Christians and Muslims, while the country's demographic distribution is widely different. In effect it means that Christians, who make up less than 40 percent of the population, have far more influence in Parliament than Muslims, with almost 60 percent.

In each voting district, seats are allotted to specific sects like Shiite, Maronite or Druse, and candidates from each sect can compete only for seats assigned to their sect. Voters, meanwhile, must return to the villages of their forefathers rather than voting where they live.

Adding to the complexity of the process are the electoral lists and alliances that have no legal standing but largely define the blocs in Parliament. Voters can strike out names from the ballots and substitute others, allowing them to mix and match from the lists.

Yet the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri in February and the political turmoil that followed have added an entirely new dimension to the election. Voting will be held under a controversial 2000 law that gerrymandered districts to best suit Syria's Lebanese allies in Parliament.

The law makes for just five electoral districts and essentially quashes the ability of some communities, especially Christian, to elect local candidates.

"With this law, we will continue to have the same forces that ran the country for the past 15 years," said General Michel Aoun, the Christian opposition leader who returned from exile earlier this month. "These elections will not produce the free and fair elections that we want. But we cannot stop now."

The delay in adopting the election law, which was finalized about two weeks ago, has further hampered matters by leaving most candidates with only two weeks to campaign. While the machinery of the large block has managed to work up in time, a handful of independent candidates have had a difficult time getting their campaigns running.

"It's a farce in any country to have an election in 20 days," said Adnan Arakji, who is leading an independent campaign against the Hariri list.

"How could you possibly talk to the millions who came down to Martyrs' Square in just 20 days?" he asked, speaking of the young protesters who gathered in downtown Beirut. Instead, candidates have scrambled to join alliances, many with onetime enemies, for greatest political gain.

"If you go into a parliamentary election, whatever election law you have, you have to make alliances," said Saad Hariri, scion of the late prime minister and leader of the Future Movement.

The real election battle will emerge in voting in the Christian-dominated Mount Lebanon region in two weeks, when several Christian leaders will vie for leadership.

"There is basically no contest among the Sunnis or among the Shiites," said Joseph Samaha, editor in chief of the Beirut daily As-Safir. "The real question is what happens to the Christians."

Opposition claims Beirut election

A leading opposition bloc in Lebanon says its candidates have won all the seats in the capital, Beirut, in a landmark parliamentary election.
Beirut voters took part in the first poll to be held for more than 30 years without Syrian troops in the country.
People in the rest of Lebanon will cast ballots over the next three Sundays.

The anti-Syrian opposition in the capital is led by Saad Hariri, the son of the assassinated former Prime Minister, Rafik Hariri.

Syrian troops withdrew last month, following a wave of opposition protests blaming Damascus for the killing in February. Syria denies any involvement.

Even before voting began, nine out of 12 Beirut seats had gone unchallenged to the Martyr Rafik Hariri list.

The BBC's Jim Muir in Beirut says turnout appears to have been low - especially in Christian parts of town where some regarded the vote as a foregone conclusion.

'New political reality'

Polling to choose 128 MPs will take place over the coming weeks, with seats allocated to equal numbers of Christians and Muslims.


Next Sunday the voting will shift to the south of the country.

The two main Shia groups, Hezbollah and Amal, have formed the Resistance, Liberation and Development list, and are expected to win most of the seats there.

Our correspondent says the main competition is likely to be within the Maronite Christian camp.

Leading Christian opposition figure Michel Aoun - who has many supporters in the north - is heading his own election list after failing to agree on a broad opposition alliance.

The election has been light on issues and heavy on horse-trading between the factions that have dominated the country's politics for decades, our correspondent says.

But the election will consolidate a new political reality largely free from Syrian interference, he says.

'We Don't Want Wars'

Saad Hariri on filling the shoes of his murdered father.

Published: 2005/05/30

Opposition triumph in Beirut poll

By Jim Muir
BBC News, Beirut


Lebanon's anti-Syrian alliance has swept the board in the first round of general elections, officials say.
Amidst a low turnout, the coalition headed by the son of murdered former Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri took all 19 seats in the capital Beirut.

Pro-Syrian Shia groups are tipped to fare better in next Sunday's second round of voting in the south.

But the country-wide result is expected to see a big parliamentary majority for Syria's opponents.

Voter apathy

Announcing the official results, the interior minister confirmed that the list headed by Saad Hariri had easily captured all 10 of the contested Beirut seats.

The other nine seats in the capital had already been won by default before the voting even began.

Mr Hariri himself won the highest personal score of votes.

But this was not the ringing endorsement that the anti-Syrian alliance had been looking for.

The turnout, at about 27%, was lower than in the last elections - when Syrian troops were still around and Syrian influence was still strong.

Voter apathy was clearly a factor, with many people feeling that the results had been stitched up in advance.

The same factors also prompted boycott calls by former General Michel Aoun, who fought the Syrians in the late 1980s, and by one of the big Armenian parties.

But the minister said the elections had passed off completely peacefully, except for one small fracas between supporters of rival parties.

That is one of the major achievements of this process - left to their own devices following the Syrian troop withdrawal last month, the Lebanese have steered away from violence as a way of settling their differences.

The minister said he hoped the mentality of war was finished for good.

But the low turnout carried a clear message of public dissatisfaction with a highly sectarian political system which allows the clan and factional leaders to strike deals and alliances which leave voters with few real choices.