Lebanon is facing a political quagmire. The five-month deadlock of being unable to form a government, since the May 6 parliamentary elections, is a reminder of the fact. Previously the country was without a president for two-and-a-half years (2014 till 2016). One can say that Lebanon can go on with a caretaker prime minister a little longer, without much hullabaloo.
This is the style of government in Beirut and this is how things get done there. Lebanon, based on a confessional political system of sects, can go on without an official government till the parties, sects, religious groups and the different ethnicities broker a political deal (which satisfies everyone) and it’s no telling how long that could take. They have a president and now they have a mandated parliament through national elections, the first since 2009, so the thinking seems to be that the country can jolly well wait until a workable sanctioned government forms.
What a callous attitude! This at a time when Lebanon is operating on a knife-edge — with an economy in doldrums, bad debts, Syrian civil war next door (which Lebanon can get easily sucked into) and an unstable regional situations with both Israel and some Arab countries.
Lebanese politicians need to wake up to the reality. The mandated parliament needs to meet and function regularly. Government formation should not be hostage to one party or sect holding out for more seats. Pertinently, it is neither the larger parties of the Free Patriotic Movement (FPM) of Michel Aoun, nor is it the Al Mustaqbal Party of Sa’ad Hariri, the current care-taker Prime Minister, but it is smaller parties like the Progressive Socialist Party of Walid Junblatt that got nine seats, who are stalling government formation, demanding more Cabinet portfolios). Similarly, the Lebanese Forces Party of Samir Geagea, which doubled its share of seats, is also demanding more ministers from the share of the FPM — a rival Christian party.
But these parties are a wider reflection of the fractious nature of Lebanese politics split around 18 sects (that are further split by the Shiite vote). Thus, it is these forces at play that have to be taken into account and satisfied, and this is not to mention the smaller parties of one, two or three seats who may be negligible on their own, but a strong force to be reckoned with if they decide to come together and form coalitions.
What is certain, however, is that the elites in Lebanese polity are behind this logjam. Needless to add, the country has certain peculiarities and special ways of doing things. A case in point was the reconvening of parliament recently by the Speaker, Nabih Berri, for a two-day session to discuss pressing draft laws that have already gone through committee stages. Using Article 69 of the Lebanese Constitution, Berri argued he had the right to convene parliament that is the executive body in the event of an absence of a workable government. And parliament did meet and pass five laws including those on data protection, waste management and anti-corruption. But again, these laws have to be implemented by a workable government, so the constitutional aspect of the move is still in doubt and open to interpretation.
What it also means is that most things related to governance and constitution continue to be in the pipeline, waiting in a “doldrum of implementation”. But as the phrase goes, “there is method to the Lebanese madness”. The holding of parliamentary sessions, which all the deputies readily agreed to, was to pass one very important anti-corruption draft law (called for by the Europeans) to release $11 billion (Dh40.58 billion) to help the country tide over its current economic crisis.
Every politician knew this was the priority and had to be done quickly and that’s why there was a ‘consensus’ on holding the parliamentary sessions regardless of the constitutional muddle. Here as well, consensus maybe the operative word regardless of the latest uttering of President Aoun on the formation of a “majority government”. This is not to say anything about the schism that may exist in the Lebanese polity that works on the basis of the ‘1943 Lebanese Pact’ that divides political power along the main Lebanese sects of Christians, Sunnis and now Shiites and Druze. Thus, Lebanon seems to have got itself into a Gordian knot, but one that can be untangled. Only the Lebanese know how and when to do that.
Marwan Asmar is a commentator based in Amman. He has long worked in journalism and has a PhD in Political Science from Leeds University in the UK.
