Beirut: Al Liwaa newspaper reported on Friday that Speaker Nabih Berri and Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah met at a secret location in Beirut’s southern suburbs. The meeting was apparently scheduled after the two men made public declarations regarding the election of a president, the first insisting that a full-package was necessary before the end of the year or Lebanon would enter a dark period, and the second linking the election of its candidate, General Michel Aoun, with due consideration for Future Movement leader Saad Hariri reassuming the premiership.
Al Liwaa did not say when the meeting occurred or how long it lasted.
Nasrallah’s offer to “discuss” the issue of the premiership should an agreement be reached over the presidency prompted Berri to add his voice to such a designation, oblivious to the notion that it was up to the elected head-of-state to settle on who would run the government after consultations with all political factions represented in parliament.
Where Berri and Nasrallah diverged, however, was in the Speaker’s backing of Marada chief Sulaiman Franjieh for the top state post, while Nasrallah reiterated once again that his party remained committed to the Aoun nomination. Ironically, Nasrallah stressed that Speaker Berri was Hezbollah’s sole candidate for the speakership post, unaware that such an election was also the prerogative of parliament.
According to Al Liwaa, sources close to Berri and Nasrallah did not confirm the meeting, but they said that the growing events might have pushed it forward, with one alleged Hezbollah senior source informing the daily that: “As soon as Hariri goes down to the parliament and elects Aoun, he will be immediately assigned as premier without any preconditions.”
