After months of deadlock and bouts of violence, the Lebanese have rare cause for celebration this week, Lucy Fielder reports The tents came down and the posters went up. A new face has been added to Beirut's pantheon of poster-children, that of Michel Suleiman, who stepped into the six months vacant presidency this week. "Dignity of the Nation" proclaimed a towering billboard near downtown's newly tent-free Martyr's Square, showing a suitably distinguished-looking Suleiman wearing a jacket and tie in place of his army commander's fatigues. Drivers negotiated the square uncertainly, causing more than the usual chaos, having apparently forgotten how to drive around downtown after an 18-month hiatus, now cleared of the opposition's tents, removed last Wednesday following the Doha deal to end Lebanon's crisis. Foreign dignitaries and Lebanese MPs walked up a red carpet into parliament, greeted by the parliamentary guard's salute, a rare display of pomp and ceremony for a country whose institutions were paralysed, presidency vacant and parliament closed until Sunday. "We have paid a high price for our national unity, so let us preserve it together, hand in hand, for God is with those who are united," Suleiman said in his inaugural speech, after he was voted in by 118 out of 127 votes. Parliament amended the constitution to allow the acting civil servant to take the presidency. Flag-waving masses thronged the streets to the sound of a marching band in the northern coastal town of Amchit, Suleiman's birthplace. Well-wishers stopped cars near the town with plates piled with sticky, sweet baklawa and cries of " mabrouk !" A flag flew at full mast outside Baabda Palace the next day for the first time in half a year, as Suleiman headed straight to his new office. He had cancelled the traditional meet-and-greet to send a message to the Lebanese, who found themselves on the brink of civil war just two weeks ago, that it was time for action. "After all these divisions, we've got a president for all Lebanese," said Rima Mokarbel, a 22-year-old student at a raucous street party downtown on Monday night, complete with a performance from pop star Haifa Wahbi. "Now hopefully we can get on with living our lives." But a taxi driver from the mainly Christian area of Ashrafiya, who preferred not to be named, disagreed. "Lahoud, Suleiman, it's the same thing," he said, referring to Suleiman's predecessor Emile Lahoud, another former general who stepped down in November and was derided by his opponents as a Syrian stooge. Reflecting a near universal sentiment, however, he said: "But at least we have a president." Waad Mohamed, an accountant in the southern suburb of Chayyah, welcomed the fact that Suleiman "stood by the resistance", both in the July 2006 war with Israel and during fighting in Beirut a few weeks ago, when the army secured positions vacated by opposition forces. "But they still have to agree on the cabinet, so I daren't hope it's all over yet." Suleiman's perceived support for Hizbullah during that fighting drew criticism from the group's opponents, leading them to question the army's vaunted neutrality. His good ties with Syria during its three decades of domination in Lebanon, necessary for him to manoeuvre as army commander, are another black mark to some. But the opposition had recently complained that he was getting closer to the ruling team. So it remains to be seen whether he will lean towards either side during his presidency, during which he will preside over a national dialogue, with Hizbullah's weapons at the top of the agenda. A national unity government with the Hizbullah-led opposition guaranteed its "blocking third" of cabinet seats is to be appointed shortly, agreed under the Qatar deal. With national unity in short supply in Lebanon, particularly over the three years since Rafik Al-Hariri's killing pitched the country headlong into crisis, many expect haggling to start there. Suleiman will appoint three ministers under the Doha deal. The removal of the tents, announced in Doha immediately after the deal by Parliament Speaker and key opposition leader Nabih Berri, added to the sense of a fresh start in Beirut. Lebanese from both trenches -- the Western-backed 14 March ruling team and the soon-to-be-former opposition -- wandered over to watch, taking photos like tourists. "I closed my shop the moment they put the tents up, and I'm opening it the moment they come down," said Joe Masinjian, owner of a sports shop on the road between Riad Al-Solh and Martyrs Squares, which the camp occupied, as an army of cleaners moved into his empty store. The camp was often portrayed as a "Shia takeover" of a Sunni heartland, or a "coup" against the Serail on the hill housing Prime Minister Fouad Al-Siniora's offices, backed by statements to that effect from Washington. But even many opposition supporters came to see it as a symbol of deadlock and stagnation. Between 65 and 80 people were killed in clashes in Beirut and the Mountain two weeks ago, during which Hizbullah and its allies briefly took over Beirut. "I thank God it's been resolved, but why didn't the politicians sit round the table to start with?" asked cellphone shop manager Said Nimr. "Did we have to bury so many dead?" With a discipline that even staunch critics agree is a trademark, Hizbullah had removed most traces of the camp by the next morning, along with smaller allied parties including Shia Amal and Michel Aoun's Christian Free Patriotic Movement. Then what appeared to be the group's elite gardening corps moved in, kneeling in Hizbullah-yellow peaked caps, trowels in hand, planting the squares' flowerbeds with begonias in an offensive to win over ruffled citizens. "We're fixing the railings and planting the borders and beds," said Hassan Ghosn, who was overseeing the work. "It will be like it was before, only more beautiful." Despite the heady mood, some columnists warned this week that the curse of sectarianism would not be lifted by electing a president or brokering a compromise. "A guard goes and another replaces him and the people gather around him to cheer and praise him, before moving to gather around their own leaders to cheer them," wrote Ibrahim Al-Amin, chairman of the board of directors at the pro-opposition daily Al-Akhbar. "This is Lebanon: the king is dead, long live the king."
