Lebanon’s 128-strong parliament met on May 31, 2022 to elect a speaker, a deputy speaker, two secretaries and three commissioners. The new legislature re-elected Nabih Berri, the head of the Amal Movement for a 7th term in a row, as speaker and MP Elias Bou Saab, who represents the Strong Lebanon parliamentary bloc, as deputy speaker.
Implications
The first session of Lebanon’s new parliament has shown implications that can be outlined as follows:
1- Confused landscape:
The parliament’s vote witnessed confusion about internal procedures although they are clearly stated in the constitution and have been in place for long years as parliamentary traditions for long. This specific session witnessed tensions and a great deal of bickering over how they should be carried out. It can be said that an essential cause of this procedural confusion is that new members of the so-called Forces of Change, which emerged out of the October 2019 popular revolution, wanted to impose their presence by objecting to these procedures. For example, they insisted on reading out the contents of voided candidacy cards. As the eldest MP, Berri, 84, who presided over the session, rejected the request but changed his mind later and approved it.
These MPs also opposed the election of two parliament secretaries based on their sect - as per the years-long tradition the two seats are reserved for a Maronite MP and a Druze MP. Their demand was opposed by the Strong Lebanon bloc, led by Jebran Basil, and the Democratic Gathering bloc, led by Taymour Jumblatt. However, the two sects eventually won the two seats.
The wrangle, however, ended up by re-electing Berri as speaker - 65 votes in the first round, and Elias Bou Saab as deputy speaker - 65 votes in the second round, while Alain Aoun of the Strong Lebanon bloc (65 votes), and Hadi Abu al-Hosn (by acclamation) were elected secretaries of the new parliament.
2- Berri’s easy re-election:
Reelection of Berri was largely seen as inevitable because the two Shi’ite powers, Hezbollah and the Amal Movement, already won almost all the parliament’s Shi’ite seats and also because under the country's political system, the position is reserved for a Shi’ite Muslim.
Although the opposition parties, i.e. the Lebanese Forces and the Forces of Change, said they would not elect Berri, they had only two choices: either to spoil the process by a lack of a majority of MPs attending the session, or to cast white ballots. As the first choice is impossible to be made, the second is ineffective and is merely a symbolic message of objection.
3- Pre-planning by the March 8 Alliance:
The parliament’s internal elections showed that the March 8 Alliance was the most organized inside the legislature and emerged as the only team to draw up a clear-cut strategy for dealing with the election. That is, Hezbollah and its allies were well-prepared for the May 31 session as they forged alliances to enable Berri to win in the first round of voting, as well as enable Bou Saab and Alain Aoun to win the positions of deputy speaker and secretary, respectively. Notably, Berri, Bou Saab and Aoun won their seats thanks to the absolute majority of 65 votes, which reflects intensified coordination among these powers over the house’s internal elections.
The team managed to overcome disagreements between the Amal Movement and the Free Patriotic Movement. The process started with drawing up electoral lists and was completed after the results were announced. Additionally, Bou Saab visited Berri ahead of the session to guarantee that the Free Patriotic Movement bloc would vote for Berri as the parliament speaker and in return for votes from the Development and Liberation bloc, of the Amal Movement, for Bou Saab himself and Aoun.
Moreover, the Free Patriotic Movement and the Marada Movement, both allied with Hezbollah, reached understandings over Bou Saab, while Berri’s personal relations with Walid Jumblatt, leader of the Pogressive Socialist Party, earned him votes from Jumblatt’s Democratic Gathering bloc.
4- Fragmentation between the Forces of Change candidates:
This fragmentation continued to govern relations inside the bloc after some candidates won the elections. Before the elections, they agreed to choose the word “justice” in the ballots. Apart from demanding justice for victims of the 2020 Beirut Port explosion as well as for Luqman Slim, a prominent Shi’ite opposition thinker and critic of Hezbollah, who was found murdered in southern Lebanon, the bloc’s candidates disagreed about the nature of coalitions they should align with. They had to choose between so-called sovereign forces such as the Lebanese Forces and the Kataeb Party, or independent forces, or completely stay out of any alliances as an independent bloc governed by its own political considerations.
5- Retreat of the majority:
In the new parliament, forces opposing the ruling coalition won a “theoretical majority” led by the Lebanese Forces party. But the litmus test for this majority i.e. the parliament’s internal elections, showed that these forces failed to prove that they are a real majority and that despite the fact that they all oppose Hezbollah and allies, their disagreement over several matters makes it hard for them to hold together as one solid bloc.
The most indicative development was that Ziad Hawwat, the candidate of the Strong Republic bloc, of the Lebanese Forces party, lost the seat of the parliament’s secretary to the candidate of the Strong Lebanon bloc, receiving only 38 out of 60 votes, the minimum number needed to secure the position.
The loss of Ghassan Skaf, an independent candidate of the Forces of Change, of the seat of deputy speaker, was no less indicative. That is, theoretical alignment between all opposition parties and the forces pushing for change inside the parliament failed to enable Skaf’s win of the seat just as it failed to defeat the candidate of the Free Patriotic Movement’s candidate Elias Bou Saab.
Future developments
The new development indicates that the political scene in Lebanon will be governed by several factors:
1- Cohesion of the Alliance between Hezbollah and the Free Patriotic Movement:
The parliament’s internal elections show that this alliance managed to overcome the shocking loss of its parliamentary majority, and that, in a bid led by Hezbollah, managed to realign its ranks to redraw its new map of alliances inside the parliament so as to preserve the gains it made over the past years that enabled it to win the majority of the parliament seats.
Accordingly, the parliament is evidently divided into two major blocs. The first one, made up of Hezbollah and allies, is more solid and more capable of organizing its forces for different elections, and also more capable of wooing and winning over independent MPs and even those from other blocs to vote for it. The second bloc, an opponent of that alliance, is evidently riddled with internal divisions that were exposed by the parliament’s internal elections. That is why its numerical superiority will be tested by agreements that may or may not be achieved, depending on developments and the type of each of the upcoming elections.
2- Diminishing odds for change:
The legislative elections proved that a change to Lebanon’s political landscape is hard to bring about despite the fact that Hezbollah and allies lost their parliamentary majority while “sovereign”, opposition and pro-reform blocs increased their share of power. Berri’s re-election for a 7th term is nothing new and no different from his re-election for the previous six terms: he won the speaker’s seat with 65 votes, compared to 98 votes in 2018. The win shows that Hezbollah and allies managed to maintain the majority in the parliament with 65 out of a total 128 seats.
3- Specter of political void:
The context of the parliament’s May 31 session is but an indication of the reality of upcoming constitutional deadlines for electing a prime minister and a president as well as forming a new cabinet. Deep divisions within the new parliament means that reaching agreement about these due processes or passing any of them at the parliament is likely to be obstructed, causing months of delay.
This can be attributed to the opposition forces’ desire to flex their muscles inside the parliament or to take uniform positions after that happened in the new parliament’s first session, and after Samir Geagea, leader of the Lebanese Forces party rejected the candidacy of any ally of Hezbollah for the position of prime minister and for any presidential candidate backed by the militia. Moreover, alignments that will take shape for electing a new prime minister or a new president will be different, especially because the Democratic Gathering bloc might take different positions on these two processes based on its opposition to Hezbollah and President Michel Aoun’s party despite its agreement with the two rival parties about Berri’s re-election.
The conclusion would be that the success of Hezbollah and its allies of Berri’s win of the parliament speaker’s seat will not be voluntarily equally possible in the next elections, of a prime minister and a president. That is because the Democratic Gathering bloc might very well take different positions. This, however, would require coordination between the Democratic Gathering, the Lebanese Forces and the Forces of Change, with the latter having to take more pragmatic positions.
