Two weeks before Lebanese elections, a clear picture has yet to emerge, writes Mohalhel Fakih Lebanon is preparing for its first parliamentary elections without Syrian involvement in three decades. The polls will take place under a controversial law that many believe will exacerbate sectarian divisions among the opposition which last month successfully pushed Syria out of Lebanon. Christian opposition leader General Michel Aoun, newly returned from his Paris exile, and Druze political heavyweight MP Walid Jumblatt, are leading the new political divide. "We have to accept the law. It is there," says Christian Maronite opposition MP Boutros Harb, who had earlier sought the intervention of Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri in amending the existing electoral law. Berri refused Christian opposition demands to approve draft legislation based largely on the 1960 electoral law which would, by dividing Lebanon into small constituencies, be less favourable to Syrian interests. Such a move, said Berri, would contravene the Taif Accords that ended the 1975-1990 Civil War. The forthcoming elections in Lebanon, a country of 17 different sects with strict confessional political quotas, will now be fought under legislation passed in 2000. "There is no other solution. I think everyone wants elections to take place on time. They have accepted this law as a solution," Berri's top ally, MP Ali Hassan Khalil, told Al- Ahram Weekly. "MPs voted unanimously to reject the letter of [President Emile] Lahoud [which called for amending the law]." That letter, sent by Lahoud, a pro-Syrian Maronite, to Berri, also pro-Syrian, called for the 2000 electoral law to be amended since it threatened to "foment political turmoil". Yet the next day Lahoud signed a decree stressing that elections must take place on schedule. MPs from all sects lashed out at Lahoud for having stalled the process of drafting a new law by re-appointing Omar Karami as prime minister. Karami held up the process, some allege, before resigning for a second time, paving the way for an agreement between the opposition and pro-Syrian loyalists weakened by popular opposition to Damascus. Deputies, even Christian MPs pressing for a new electoral law based on smaller districts, rejected Lahoud's machinations as political ploys. Lahoud also managed to alienate his Hizbullah allies, while opposition leader Walid Jumblatt went so far as to demand that the head of state "be sacked". Jumblatt accused Lahoud of presiding over a disintegrating Syrian-Lebanese military regime that, he alleges, is responsible for the 14 February assassination of former prime minister Rafiq Al-Hariri. Lahoud, who supported the 2000 law when Syria's influence was at its height, responded to Jumblatt without naming him, criticising deputies "whose hands are soaked with blood and corruption". A parliamentary session on Saturday ended in chaos after Berri refused any debate on amending the electoral law. The country's new justice minister who replaced Adnan Addoum, one of several pro- Syrian security figures dismissed after Al- Hariri's assassination, said any amendment of the electoral law would delay the election of the 128-member parliament in which seats are split equally between Christians and Muslims. The international community has been pressuring Prime Minister Najib Mikati to ensure the polls are held on schedule on 29 May. "The 2000 law was imposed on Lebanon but we will not boycott elections. We will try to minimise its negative effects," Elias Zoghbi, spokesman of Aoun's Free Patriotic Movement, told the Weekly. "The [law] aims to reproduce an electorate that replicates that created under Syrian tutelage." Aoun has been critical of the law, hinting that some opposition figures, including his new rival Jumblatt, colluded with Berri and Hizbullah in order to retain the 2000 law. The Maronite Church has repeatedly demanded a return to the 1960 law arguing that, by dividing Lebanon into smaller constituencies it allows for the representation of Christian communities located in pre- dominantly Muslim regions. Muslims fear the creation of Christian cantons and believe themselves better served by large constituencies. Christians comprise a third of Lebanon's population though the post-war Taif dispensation divided power equally between both communities. Before the war Maronites were the dominant political power and some Muslims have expressed concern that there are those who now want to see them regain that position. "Respect Taif," Jumblatt warned following Aoun's return. The agreement re-distributed powers, granting most of the Maronite Christian president's executive authority over the Sunni Muslim prime minister. It also stipulated an eventual end to confessional quotas. Hardline Maronites insist the agreement must be amended. "We cannot breach Taif," MP Hassan Khalil told the Weekly. "Adopting the 2000 law keeps the door open for the drafting of electoral legislation in line with the agreement. Demanding small districts means cementing the political status quo which is in breach of Taif," he said. Khalil warns against inciting sectarian rhetoric while stressing that the Lebanese "have overcome the threat of war". But Aoun, who makes no secret of his presidential ambitions, risks plunging the country into renewed sectarian strife if he fails to first implement a pledge to rid the political system of sectarian quotas. A heavy-handed reformist agenda that attempts to re-distribute executive powers could antagonise Muslims whose authority was boosted by the Taif Accord. It could also lead Muslims to seek the implementation of other clauses in the agreement annulling the quotas that prevent them from seeking the presidency, the army command, the Central Bank governorship and other key positions. Christians are resolute that they are only demanding a redress to imbalances that affected their communities when Syria was in control. Jumblatt has already dubbed Aoun's return the "coming tsunami". He has been engaged in a public dispute with Aoun over who should take credit for Syria's pullout. Jumblatt said Al-Hariri's blood was the price paid; the general insists his own "resistance" hastened the end of the "Syrian occupation". Efforts to create an electoral alliance between the two leaders have clearly failed and they will now head competing lists of candidates. Boutros Harb maintains rising sectarian rhetoric reflects only a fraction of the political tensions that generally grip Lebanon ahead of legislative elections. "The issue is political. There are efforts to cement national unity. No one should fear conflict. The Lebanese are nationalists so even if there are divisions they will protect the country," he told the Weekly. Some religious divisions are being glossed over in the run up to the poll. MP and former minister Suleiman Franjieh, who once enjoyed the support of Damascus, believes "there was an under-the- table deal" between opposition MPs and pro-Syrians, both Christians and Muslims. Speaker Berri, Hizbullah, Saadeddin Al- Hariri and Jumblatt deny they forged an alliance to counter Christian opposition efforts to reduce the size of voting districts. Indeed, Rafiq Al-Hariri had supported smaller constituencies before his assassination and many Muslim opposition MPs also reject the 2000 law. One of the strangest outcomes of the changing political scene could be an unlikely alliance between General Aoun and Hizbullah in parliamentary elections. The latter has already axed a top ally of Damascus and backer of President Lahoud, Deputy Prime Minister Essam Fares. Already overshadowed by political complexity the elections will also take place against a backdrop of violence. A fifth bombing on Friday night rocked the Christian port city of Jouniyeh, near Beirut, injuring 24. Early reports said a Sri Lankan national was killed, and unconfirmed rumours suggest the Al-Mahaba Christian religious radio station -- which has aired testimonies of Lebanese detained in Syria and appeals for the release of hundreds languishing in Syrian prisons -- was the target. Interior Minister Hassan Sabeh noted "lots of similarities between this explosion and the four previous ones". The Lebanese people, he continued, "insist on pursuing their course. I say to these criminals that they will not stop the Lebanese people from forging ahead with the journey they started on 14 March," the day on which more than one million Lebanese, representing all the country's sects, marched together in Beirut demanding Syria's pullout, the resignation of security chiefs blamed for Al-Hariri's killing, and the truth behind the assassination.
