Cedars Politics: The Current Electoral System in Lebanon
“The political system in Lebanon is reaffirming and maintaining the destabilization of the country indefinitely.” Following the recent elections in Lebanon, Prof. Giancarlo Elia Valori discusses the internal and external sphere of power relations in the Lebanese political system
Giancarlo Elia Valori
| 24/05/2018
A polling station during Lebanon's parliamentary elections on May 6, 2018 (Photo: AP)
The general elections in Lebanon were held on May 6 last. They had originally been scheduled for 2013 but, due to the repeated failure of Parliament to elect a new President from April 23, 2014, to October 31, 2016, because no candidate had succeeded in obtaining the required two-thirds majority, the Parliamentary term had been extended at first until 2017 and then until 2018.
A new electoral law had been adopted in 2017, providing a proportional representation system for the first time in the history of the country.
The maximum proportional representation system in elections coincides with the maximum destabilization of a country.
Finally, Michel Aoun was elected President on October 31, 2016, at the 46th electoral session of the Lebanese Parliament, breaking a 29-month deadlock.
Aoun is a Maronite Christian, as provided for by the Lebanese Constitution, and he was Head of the Armed Forces as early as 1984. From 1988 to mid-October 1990, he also served as Prime Minister appointed by the then departing Lebanese President Amine Gemayel, whose controversial decision led to the paradoxical situation of having two rival Lebanese governments contending for power, one by Aoun and the other by Selim Hoss, apparently pro-Western and self-appointed Prime Minister.
The Lebanese Constitution lays down, inter alia, that the President must be a Maronite Christian, the Head of government an Islamic Sunni and the President of Parliament a Shi’ite.
The Lebanese Constitution, however, does not define – as also happens in other Middle East countries – traditional political groups, but sectarian parties of religious origin and affiliation.
Until Aoun’s election, two coalitions competed in the country. The first one was the March 14 Alliance led by Saad Hariri, a politician close to Saudi Arabia floundering in a very severe financial and political crisis – a political alliance currently established, together with the Christians of Samir Geagea, by the group of Sami Gemayel, the Head of the Maronite Phalanx, and by Walid Jumblatt, the historical leader of the Druses.
From the very beginning, the whole “March 14 Alliance” was closely linked to Saudi interests.
It is worth recalling that Lebanon is the third most indebted country in the world, with a 150% share of the GDP, a total net indebtedness of USD79 billion and an increase in the debt/GDP ratio which, according to the International Monetary Fund, could reach a 180% share in three years.
In a forthcoming conference to be held in Paris, the Lebanese government will ask for foreign investment targeted to infrastructure equal to at least USD16 billion, while banks do not provide liquidity to anyone.
As evidenced by the growth of grassroots parties, infrastructure, and local public services, as well as urban management issues, are the true weak point of the Lebanese State.
70% of the Lebanese public spending goes to wages and salaries and to debt servicing, in particular, while as much as 10% goes on subsidies to the electricity and energy bills of the poorest population.
Hence, there is no room for any government to reduce the Lebanese public spending significantly.
Therefore, there is always a very close link between the dysfunctionality of political systems and State’s indebtedness and, finally, between the rigidity of electoral representation and the impossibility of controlling the connection between debt and GDP.
This should be studied to further clarify the “Italian case.”
The March 8 Alliance, however, was established by Hezbollah – the Shi’ite Party founded in 1982 by Imam Khomeini “as if it were the apple of his eye,” as well as by Nabih Berri’s Shi’ite movement of Amal (Hope) and, finally, by Michel Aoun’s Maronite Christian Party.
According to what is currently maintained in Lebanon, the agreement between the two major factions envisages the “green light” of the March 8 Alliance for the future premiership of Saad Hariri, one of the leaders of the other coalition.
However, who is Michel Aoun? First and foremost, the military commander of the 8th Brigade of the Lebanese Armed Forces who succeeded in stopping the offensive of the Druse leader Walid Jumblatt who, at that time, was leading the pro-Syrian militia.
As already stated, in the years following his appointment as Head of government, Aoun clashed especially with both the Shi’ite and Druse groups and the Maronite militia of Samir Geagea’s “Phalanx.”
As was also the case in Northern Ireland and Spain, with the Basque movement, the political revolution easily gives way to illegal activities.
In 1989, after the signing of the inter-Lebanese peace agreement – a sectarian pact, named Taif Accord because it was made in Taif, Saudi Arabia, which put an end to the Lebanese civil war – the new President Hrawi dismissed Michel Aoun and ordered him to leave the Presidential Palace. He refused to dismiss and barricaded himself in the Palace to prepare for his defense, thus refusing to give up the power.
Not very long after the attacks on the Presidential Palace, Aoun was asked to leave Lebanon and later went into exile in France. For the former Head of the Lebanese Armed Forces, the exile was inevitable after the victory of the Syrian forces that entered Lebanon to stabilize the “province” of Beirut.
It was a period in which Aoun established very close relations with the French intelligence services and, above all, with the Israeli ones.
During those years, Lebanon became a full Syrian protectorate.
Nevertheless, Aoun came back to the political scene and to Lebanon in 2004, when the UN voted Resolution No. 1559, which obliged all the Syrian Armed Forces to leave Syria.
Aoun ended 15 years of exile when he returned to Lebanon on May 7, 2015 – eleven days after the withdrawal of the Syrian Army from Lebanon following the assassination of Rafic Hariri on February 14, 2005. The huge demonstrations following the assassination of Hariri, the guarantor of the Lebanese reconstruction – although with the Saudi money – after the massive destruction caused by the civil war, forced the Syrians to leave the country.
It was from that moment that Aoun, who had long secretly and later overtly returned to Lebanon, quickly began to approach and come closer to his long-standing enemies, the Shi’ites of Hezbollah and Amal.
Amal, the old movement of Nabih Berri, had fought against Hezbollah for control over South Beirut in the “Lebanese civil war” and, however, had been founded by Musa al-Sadr, the Imam who established the belonging of the Alawites – hence the elite currently ruling Syria – to the Shi’ite Islam and was most likely killed, upon Gaddafi’s order, in Rome in 1978.
As can be easily seen, the Lebanese politics has always been a game of shadows and paradoxes.
In 2008, however, Aoun had failed in his first presidential project, while reestablishing relations with his old Maronite enemy, Samir Geagea, who in 2016, withdrew from the presidential election and made his votes converge on Aoun.
Nevertheless, Aoun could anticipate the real presidential victory only when Saad Hariri, weakened by the financial crisis of his company operating in Saudi Arabia and pressed by the French Embassy for other very urgent financial problems, gave him his support – certainly in return for a future Premiership, thus abandoning the Christian candidate of his coalition, Suleiman Frangieh jr.
Aoun, however, is 82 years old now. He is supposed to pave the way for his son-in-law and current Foreign Minister, Gebrain Bassil.
Moreover, the two coalitions – both heirs of the civil war – are ever less voted by young people and by all those who want to lay the ghost of the Lebanese political and military factionalism. There are many of them.
Not surprisingly, in the latest elections, the two coalitions even joined forces to defeat the new civic and environmental movement known as Beirut Madinati ("Beirut My City") which, however, unexpectedly won one of Beirut's three electoral districts.
Beirut Madinati is a movement which emerged after the 2015-16 Lebanese protests as a reaction to power and water shortages, streets filled with trash and dizzying urban infrastructure. Nothing destroys political representation as a disaster in basic public services.
Nothing supported Hezbollah more than its supply of sectarian welfare, which replaces a State that no longer has the money nor the rules – stupidly “liberalized” – to help the poor in hospitals, schools and at work.
The rules of privatization will destroy political representation also in the West.
As can be easily imagined, the core of the Lebanese political system is currently the intelligence service network.
Also as a military leader, Aoun is still at the center of the Lebanese intelligence system.
He is the guarantor and the mitigator of both the demands of the Shi’ite alliances, including Hezbollah – Aoun's ally since 2005 and traditional point of reference for Syria and, above all, for Iran – and of the multifarious, but powerful world of Sunni militias.
The Sunnis are a politically growing area no longer tolerating the defeats of the “jihadist brothers” in Syria and Iraq, nor the perceived dominance of Hezbollah and Amal.
Lebanon has four intelligence agencies: the “Intelligence Section of the Interior Security Forces” (IS-ISF); the “General Directorate of General Security” (GDGS); the “Military Intelligence Directorate” (MID) and the “State Security Directorate” (SSD).
The IS-ISF deals with counterterrorism, anti-drugs, and criminal investigations; the GDGS works on visas and passports, censorship, port and airport checks, as well as counterintelligence and counterterrorism. Conversely, the MID operates in the field of military espionage, the protection of Armed Forces’ sites and facilities, as well as the prevention of political upheavals. Finally, the SSD protects public offices and important personalities.
General Antoine Suleyman Mansour has recently replaced his peer Camille Daher as Head of the MID.
Mansour was born in the Beqaa Valley and followed counterterrorism courses in the USA, in France, but above all in Syria.
The Beqaa Valley is the axis of Hezbollah's economic and strategic power. It is in that region, which is essential also for Israel’s defense, that the “Party of God” organizes its drug trafficking and where its main very secret arms caches are located.
The “Shi’ite pathway” stretching from Iraq to Teheran up to South Beirut – as currently imagined – is vital for the very survival of Hezbollah, but also for the Iranian power system.
It is the most evident threat to the Israeli system, especially if we relate it to the Iranian operations in the Gaza Strip and in the Territories.
Moreover, General Daher also dealt – directly with Saudi Arabia – a supply of brand new French weapons paid by Saudi Arabia and worth USD3 billion. Nonetheless, the negotiations failed, and the weapons were later bought by Saudi Arabia for its armed forces.
It is easy to understand what this meant for the Lebanese internal political equilibrium.
It is said that General Daher bears the brunt of his affinity with General Kahwahj, former Chief of Staff in Beirut and, above all, Aoun’s sworn enemy and internal rival.
General Karaa, the first Head of the SSD and Abdou Fattou, responsible for the confidential funds of the Service, were replaced by Tony Saliba and Wafiq Jizzini, respectively. In 2008, General Karaa had investigated into Hezbollah’s advanced and confidential communication network, which is very powerful and secret, while Abbas Ibrahim, who leads the GSDS, is explicitly supported by the “Party of God” and hence has remained at his place.
Ibrahim has also held the recent and complex negotiations between the ISIS, Al Nusra and Hezbollah for the transfer – hence the recent increase in the Lebanese sectarian violence – of Sunni terrorists to Syria, under the direct protection of Hezbollah and the Lebanese intelligence Service.
Hence, what is the current electoral system in Lebanon? In June 2017, the various religious and political forces reached an agreement on electoral procedures.
The agreement led to a proportional representation system, wanted above all by the Maronite world, and, in particular, by Aoun’s movement, namely the Free Patriotic Movement, as well as by its Shi’ite allies.
Considering the 6.2 million inhabitants of Lebanon, Muslims account for 54%, of whom 27% are Sunni and 27% Shi’ite, with the latter growing significantly. Christians account for 40.5%, of whom 21% are Maronite, 8% are Greek Orthodox, 5% are Greek Catholics, and 6.5% are other types of Christians. The Druses account for 5.6%.
As could be easily predicted, currently Hezbollah is the real winner of the latest Lebanese elections.
Together with Amal, united in a joint list called Al Amal wal Wafa (“Hope and Loyalty”), the two Shi’ite Parties, along with other friendly lists, won 13 and 15 seats respectively.
Beforehand, the two pro-Iranian Parties, with a very long history of a violent struggle between each other, had 13 seats each in the Lebanese Parliament, which has a total of 128 seats.
As many as 7,000 clearly documented infringements of the electoral procedures were checked, with a voter turnout lower than 50%. Hence many operations of tampering with people’s will were recorded, whatever this means in Lebanon.
Aoun’s movement rose from 18 to 22 seats while, at least this time, Geagea’s group – Hezbollah’s traditional Maronite opponent and Aoun’s current ally – rose from 8 to 14 seats.
Also, the Azm Party of former Prime Minister Najib Mikati rose from one to four seats. The Azm Party was founded by Mikati, the well-known Premier of the March 8 Alliance, with the support of Hezbollah, Aoun, and their local allies.
The Syrian National Socialist Party and Tashnag, the political group of reference for the Lebanese Armenian community, obtained two and three seats, respectively.
However, Kollouna Watani (“We are All National”) – a recently-established political group – got no seats.
Saad Hariri’s Party, which seems to be no longer close to its Saudi friends’ heart, fell from 33 to only 21 seats. Moreover, in Beirut, in the traditional strongholds of Hariri’s Future Movement, the Shi’ites won.
The Druse Party of Walid Jumblatt, namely the Progressive Socialist Party, lost two seats falling from 11 to 9.
Here demography rather than militant politics matters – as well as the great Lebanese migration of the middle class to Europe and the United States.
The Kataeb Party, the old Maronite Phalanx of Sami Gemayel, fell from five to three seats.
Marada, Frangieh's old movement, kept its three seats.
Certainly, the prorogatio of Parliamentary terms of office began with the outbreak of riots in 1975 – except for the extraordinary appointment of 40 MPs elected in 1991. Hence the Parliamentary Assembly elected in 1975 lasted in office precisely until 1991.
The Parliament just dissolved had been elected in 2009, for four years only, but its term was extended four times in a row.
Furthermore, the election of President Suleiman on May 25, 2008, had been made possible only by the inter-Lebanese Dialogue held in Doha on May 21, 2008, shortly after the (military) show of strength by Hezbollah in West Beirut, right in the Sunni area of the capital city.
Therefore, the elections of June 2009 directly followed President Michel Suleiman's rise to power.
Four years later, the elections already scheduled for June 7, 2013, were postponed again.
The Parliament continuously renewed its term of office until 2014, then until June 2017 and again until 2018. A failed link between the Presidency and local representation.
Moreover, at a military level, since that moment Hezbollah has been a unit integrated with the rest of the Lebanese Armed Forces.
Hence, the Syrian army, the “Party of God” and the Al Quds Iranian brigades have become actors on the operational front as early as the fall of Aleppo, on December 22, 2016, while a real Iranian military protectorate on Lebanon has been created by the presence of said three forces along the axis stretching from Northern Syria to Southern Lebanon, through the Golan Heights.
Later, after the clear support of the “Party of God” to the Houthi insurgency in Yemen, the cleavage, i.e., the final “break” between Sunnis and Shi’ites, widened, even in Lebanon alone.
Therefore, after the end of the “Caliphate,” Saudi Arabia and its allies have no elements on which to manipulate the balance of power and forces in the Iraq-Syria-Lebanon axis.
All this happens while Saad Hariri, together with the Saudi “enemies” that are still in the broad March 8 Alliance, are agreeing with Hezbollah to form a “national unity” government. Hariri, who is floundering in a financial crisis, needs this government to get back on track.
As an old South American parliamentarian used to say, politics “es muy lucrativa pero muy peligrosa.”
With specific reference to Hariri, this is the sense of his de facto “being held hostage” by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman as from November 2017.
This is the internal and external sphere of power relations in the Lebanese political system.
The rationale of the new electoral system provided for by Law No. 44 of June 17, 2017, is to project internally the external equilibria which ensure unity and funding to the Lebanese State.
With a view to avoiding further chaos, after Michel Aoun’s election, all the electoral districts and constituencies were designed to preserve and stabilize the traditional religious-sectarian electorate.
In fact, electoral law No. 44/2017 divides the country into fifteen major electoral constituencies, further divided into 26 cazas, namely minor electoral districts, thus putting together the classic proportional representation system with a mechanism defined by the specific “preferential voting.”
This means that each voter shall vote for one of the competing lists and shall be entitled to cast one preferential vote for a candidate of the same list he/she has chosen.
This voting system selects candidates only within the caza, the first and smallest electoral district.
The vote is valid only if the preferential votes are cast in all fifteen regional constituencies – with the electoral quotient determined by the number of voters in a given constituency divided by the number of seats already allocated for that constituency.
The preferential voting, however, defines the ranking – hence the winner at caza level.
In other words – as is also the case with Western Europe – this happens to create a sort of electoral elite as against the mass of irrelevant representatives.
Therefore, the Lebanese system creates a hidden electoral bonus, but only for the best-known candidates.
Nonetheless, the real issue is another one: the division is currently within the March 14 Alliance, with the Sunni, Druse and Christian side opposing the Syrian designs on Lebanon, as against the March 8 Alliance that is increasingly linked to the Syrian regime and its external supporters.
Hence, the local paradoxes of a now clear geopolitical framework: Samir Geagea’s “Lebanese Forces” are hostile to the Syrian-Iranian axis and close to Saudi Arabia, but are allied with the Free Democratic Movement of Aoun and his son-in-law Bassil, who have instead signed a written contract with Hezbollah.
Therefore, the political system in Lebanon is reaffirming and maintaining the destabilization of the country indefinitely. It brings back memories.
“The political system in Lebanon is reaffirming and maintaining the destabilization of the country indefinitely.” Following the recent elections in Lebanon, Prof. Giancarlo Elia Valori discusses the internal and external sphere of power relations in the Lebanese political system
A polling station during Lebanon's parliamentary elections on May 6, 2018 (Photo: AP)
The general elections in Lebanon were held on May 6 last. They had originally been scheduled for 2013 but, due to the repeated failure of Parliament to elect a new President from April 23, 2014, to October 31, 2016, because no candidate had succeeded in obtaining the required two-thirds majority, the Parliamentary term had been extended at first until 2017 and then until 2018.
A new electoral law had been adopted in 2017, providing a proportional representation system for the first time in the history of the country.
The maximum proportional representation system in elections coincides with the maximum destabilization of a country.
Finally, Michel Aoun was elected President on October 31, 2016, at the 46th electoral session of the Lebanese Parliament, breaking a 29-month deadlock.
Aoun is a Maronite Christian, as provided for by the Lebanese Constitution, and he was Head of the Armed Forces as early as 1984. From 1988 to mid-October 1990, he also served as Prime Minister appointed by the then departing Lebanese President Amine Gemayel, whose controversial decision led to the paradoxical situation of having two rival Lebanese governments contending for power, one by Aoun and the other by Selim Hoss, apparently pro-Western and self-appointed Prime Minister.
The Lebanese Constitution lays down, inter alia, that the President must be a Maronite Christian, the Head of government an Islamic Sunni and the President of Parliament a Shi’ite.
The Lebanese Constitution, however, does not define – as also happens in other Middle East countries – traditional political groups, but sectarian parties of religious origin and affiliation.
Until Aoun’s election, two coalitions competed in the country. The first one was the March 14 Alliance led by Saad Hariri, a politician close to Saudi Arabia floundering in a very severe financial and political crisis – a political alliance currently established, together with the Christians of Samir Geagea, by the group of Sami Gemayel, the Head of the Maronite Phalanx, and by Walid Jumblatt, the historical leader of the Druses.
From the very beginning, the whole “March 14 Alliance” was closely linked to Saudi interests.
It is worth recalling that Lebanon is the third most indebted country in the world, with a 150% share of the GDP, a total net indebtedness of USD79 billion and an increase in the debt/GDP ratio which, according to the International Monetary Fund, could reach a 180% share in three years.
In a forthcoming conference to be held in Paris, the Lebanese government will ask for foreign investment targeted to infrastructure equal to at least USD16 billion, while banks do not provide liquidity to anyone.
As evidenced by the growth of grassroots parties, infrastructure, and local public services, as well as urban management issues, are the true weak point of the Lebanese State.
70% of the Lebanese public spending goes to wages and salaries and to debt servicing, in particular, while as much as 10% goes on subsidies to the electricity and energy bills of the poorest population.
Hence, there is no room for any government to reduce the Lebanese public spending significantly.
Therefore, there is always a very close link between the dysfunctionality of political systems and State’s indebtedness and, finally, between the rigidity of electoral representation and the impossibility of controlling the connection between debt and GDP.
This should be studied to further clarify the “Italian case.”
The March 8 Alliance, however, was established by Hezbollah – the Shi’ite Party founded in 1982 by Imam Khomeini “as if it were the apple of his eye,” as well as by Nabih Berri’s Shi’ite movement of Amal (Hope) and, finally, by Michel Aoun’s Maronite Christian Party.
According to what is currently maintained in Lebanon, the agreement between the two major factions envisages the “green light” of the March 8 Alliance for the future premiership of Saad Hariri, one of the leaders of the other coalition.
However, who is Michel Aoun? First and foremost, the military commander of the 8th Brigade of the Lebanese Armed Forces who succeeded in stopping the offensive of the Druse leader Walid Jumblatt who, at that time, was leading the pro-Syrian militia.
As already stated, in the years following his appointment as Head of government, Aoun clashed especially with both the Shi’ite and Druse groups and the Maronite militia of Samir Geagea’s “Phalanx.”
As was also the case in Northern Ireland and Spain, with the Basque movement, the political revolution easily gives way to illegal activities.
In 1989, after the signing of the inter-Lebanese peace agreement – a sectarian pact, named Taif Accord because it was made in Taif, Saudi Arabia, which put an end to the Lebanese civil war – the new President Hrawi dismissed Michel Aoun and ordered him to leave the Presidential Palace. He refused to dismiss and barricaded himself in the Palace to prepare for his defense, thus refusing to give up the power.
Not very long after the attacks on the Presidential Palace, Aoun was asked to leave Lebanon and later went into exile in France. For the former Head of the Lebanese Armed Forces, the exile was inevitable after the victory of the Syrian forces that entered Lebanon to stabilize the “province” of Beirut.
It was a period in which Aoun established very close relations with the French intelligence services and, above all, with the Israeli ones.
During those years, Lebanon became a full Syrian protectorate.
Nevertheless, Aoun came back to the political scene and to Lebanon in 2004, when the UN voted Resolution No. 1559, which obliged all the Syrian Armed Forces to leave Syria.
Aoun ended 15 years of exile when he returned to Lebanon on May 7, 2015 – eleven days after the withdrawal of the Syrian Army from Lebanon following the assassination of Rafic Hariri on February 14, 2005. The huge demonstrations following the assassination of Hariri, the guarantor of the Lebanese reconstruction – although with the Saudi money – after the massive destruction caused by the civil war, forced the Syrians to leave the country.
It was from that moment that Aoun, who had long secretly and later overtly returned to Lebanon, quickly began to approach and come closer to his long-standing enemies, the Shi’ites of Hezbollah and Amal.
Amal, the old movement of Nabih Berri, had fought against Hezbollah for control over South Beirut in the “Lebanese civil war” and, however, had been founded by Musa al-Sadr, the Imam who established the belonging of the Alawites – hence the elite currently ruling Syria – to the Shi’ite Islam and was most likely killed, upon Gaddafi’s order, in Rome in 1978.
As can be easily seen, the Lebanese politics has always been a game of shadows and paradoxes.
In 2008, however, Aoun had failed in his first presidential project, while reestablishing relations with his old Maronite enemy, Samir Geagea, who in 2016, withdrew from the presidential election and made his votes converge on Aoun.
Nevertheless, Aoun could anticipate the real presidential victory only when Saad Hariri, weakened by the financial crisis of his company operating in Saudi Arabia and pressed by the French Embassy for other very urgent financial problems, gave him his support – certainly in return for a future Premiership, thus abandoning the Christian candidate of his coalition, Suleiman Frangieh jr.
Aoun, however, is 82 years old now. He is supposed to pave the way for his son-in-law and current Foreign Minister, Gebrain Bassil.
Moreover, the two coalitions – both heirs of the civil war – are ever less voted by young people and by all those who want to lay the ghost of the Lebanese political and military factionalism. There are many of them.
Not surprisingly, in the latest elections, the two coalitions even joined forces to defeat the new civic and environmental movement known as Beirut Madinati ("Beirut My City") which, however, unexpectedly won one of Beirut's three electoral districts.
Beirut Madinati is a movement which emerged after the 2015-16 Lebanese protests as a reaction to power and water shortages, streets filled with trash and dizzying urban infrastructure. Nothing destroys political representation as a disaster in basic public services.
Nothing supported Hezbollah more than its supply of sectarian welfare, which replaces a State that no longer has the money nor the rules – stupidly “liberalized” – to help the poor in hospitals, schools and at work.
The rules of privatization will destroy political representation also in the West.
As can be easily imagined, the core of the Lebanese political system is currently the intelligence service network.
Also as a military leader, Aoun is still at the center of the Lebanese intelligence system.
He is the guarantor and the mitigator of both the demands of the Shi’ite alliances, including Hezbollah – Aoun's ally since 2005 and traditional point of reference for Syria and, above all, for Iran – and of the multifarious, but powerful world of Sunni militias.
The Sunnis are a politically growing area no longer tolerating the defeats of the “jihadist brothers” in Syria and Iraq, nor the perceived dominance of Hezbollah and Amal.
Lebanon has four intelligence agencies: the “Intelligence Section of the Interior Security Forces” (IS-ISF); the “General Directorate of General Security” (GDGS); the “Military Intelligence Directorate” (MID) and the “State Security Directorate” (SSD).
The IS-ISF deals with counterterrorism, anti-drugs, and criminal investigations; the GDGS works on visas and passports, censorship, port and airport checks, as well as counterintelligence and counterterrorism. Conversely, the MID operates in the field of military espionage, the protection of Armed Forces’ sites and facilities, as well as the prevention of political upheavals. Finally, the SSD protects public offices and important personalities.
General Antoine Suleyman Mansour has recently replaced his peer Camille Daher as Head of the MID.
Mansour was born in the Beqaa Valley and followed counterterrorism courses in the USA, in France, but above all in Syria.
The Beqaa Valley is the axis of Hezbollah's economic and strategic power. It is in that region, which is essential also for Israel’s defense, that the “Party of God” organizes its drug trafficking and where its main very secret arms caches are located.
The “Shi’ite pathway” stretching from Iraq to Teheran up to South Beirut – as currently imagined – is vital for the very survival of Hezbollah, but also for the Iranian power system.
It is the most evident threat to the Israeli system, especially if we relate it to the Iranian operations in the Gaza Strip and in the Territories.
Moreover, General Daher also dealt – directly with Saudi Arabia – a supply of brand new French weapons paid by Saudi Arabia and worth USD3 billion. Nonetheless, the negotiations failed, and the weapons were later bought by Saudi Arabia for its armed forces.
It is easy to understand what this meant for the Lebanese internal political equilibrium.
It is said that General Daher bears the brunt of his affinity with General Kahwahj, former Chief of Staff in Beirut and, above all, Aoun’s sworn enemy and internal rival.
General Karaa, the first Head of the SSD and Abdou Fattou, responsible for the confidential funds of the Service, were replaced by Tony Saliba and Wafiq Jizzini, respectively. In 2008, General Karaa had investigated into Hezbollah’s advanced and confidential communication network, which is very powerful and secret, while Abbas Ibrahim, who leads the GSDS, is explicitly supported by the “Party of God” and hence has remained at his place.
Ibrahim has also held the recent and complex negotiations between the ISIS, Al Nusra and Hezbollah for the transfer – hence the recent increase in the Lebanese sectarian violence – of Sunni terrorists to Syria, under the direct protection of Hezbollah and the Lebanese intelligence Service.
Hence, what is the current electoral system in Lebanon? In June 2017, the various religious and political forces reached an agreement on electoral procedures.
The agreement led to a proportional representation system, wanted above all by the Maronite world, and, in particular, by Aoun’s movement, namely the Free Patriotic Movement, as well as by its Shi’ite allies.
Considering the 6.2 million inhabitants of Lebanon, Muslims account for 54%, of whom 27% are Sunni and 27% Shi’ite, with the latter growing significantly. Christians account for 40.5%, of whom 21% are Maronite, 8% are Greek Orthodox, 5% are Greek Catholics, and 6.5% are other types of Christians. The Druses account for 5.6%.
As could be easily predicted, currently Hezbollah is the real winner of the latest Lebanese elections.
Together with Amal, united in a joint list called Al Amal wal Wafa (“Hope and Loyalty”), the two Shi’ite Parties, along with other friendly lists, won 13 and 15 seats respectively.
Beforehand, the two pro-Iranian Parties, with a very long history of a violent struggle between each other, had 13 seats each in the Lebanese Parliament, which has a total of 128 seats.
As many as 7,000 clearly documented infringements of the electoral procedures were checked, with a voter turnout lower than 50%. Hence many operations of tampering with people’s will were recorded, whatever this means in Lebanon.
Aoun’s movement rose from 18 to 22 seats while, at least this time, Geagea’s group – Hezbollah’s traditional Maronite opponent and Aoun’s current ally – rose from 8 to 14 seats.
Also, the Azm Party of former Prime Minister Najib Mikati rose from one to four seats. The Azm Party was founded by Mikati, the well-known Premier of the March 8 Alliance, with the support of Hezbollah, Aoun, and their local allies.
The Syrian National Socialist Party and Tashnag, the political group of reference for the Lebanese Armenian community, obtained two and three seats, respectively.
However, Kollouna Watani (“We are All National”) – a recently-established political group – got no seats.
Saad Hariri’s Party, which seems to be no longer close to its Saudi friends’ heart, fell from 33 to only 21 seats. Moreover, in Beirut, in the traditional strongholds of Hariri’s Future Movement, the Shi’ites won.
The Druse Party of Walid Jumblatt, namely the Progressive Socialist Party, lost two seats falling from 11 to 9.
Here demography rather than militant politics matters – as well as the great Lebanese migration of the middle class to Europe and the United States.
The Kataeb Party, the old Maronite Phalanx of Sami Gemayel, fell from five to three seats.
Marada, Frangieh's old movement, kept its three seats.
Certainly, the prorogatio of Parliamentary terms of office began with the outbreak of riots in 1975 – except for the extraordinary appointment of 40 MPs elected in 1991. Hence the Parliamentary Assembly elected in 1975 lasted in office precisely until 1991.
The Parliament just dissolved had been elected in 2009, for four years only, but its term was extended four times in a row.
Furthermore, the election of President Suleiman on May 25, 2008, had been made possible only by the inter-Lebanese Dialogue held in Doha on May 21, 2008, shortly after the (military) show of strength by Hezbollah in West Beirut, right in the Sunni area of the capital city.
Therefore, the elections of June 2009 directly followed President Michel Suleiman's rise to power.
Four years later, the elections already scheduled for June 7, 2013, were postponed again.
The Parliament continuously renewed its term of office until 2014, then until June 2017 and again until 2018. A failed link between the Presidency and local representation.
Moreover, at a military level, since that moment Hezbollah has been a unit integrated with the rest of the Lebanese Armed Forces.
Hence, the Syrian army, the “Party of God” and the Al Quds Iranian brigades have become actors on the operational front as early as the fall of Aleppo, on December 22, 2016, while a real Iranian military protectorate on Lebanon has been created by the presence of said three forces along the axis stretching from Northern Syria to Southern Lebanon, through the Golan Heights.
Later, after the clear support of the “Party of God” to the Houthi insurgency in Yemen, the cleavage, i.e., the final “break” between Sunnis and Shi’ites, widened, even in Lebanon alone.
Therefore, after the end of the “Caliphate,” Saudi Arabia and its allies have no elements on which to manipulate the balance of power and forces in the Iraq-Syria-Lebanon axis.
All this happens while Saad Hariri, together with the Saudi “enemies” that are still in the broad March 8 Alliance, are agreeing with Hezbollah to form a “national unity” government. Hariri, who is floundering in a financial crisis, needs this government to get back on track.
As an old South American parliamentarian used to say, politics “es muy lucrativa pero muy peligrosa.”
With specific reference to Hariri, this is the sense of his de facto “being held hostage” by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman as from November 2017.
This is the internal and external sphere of power relations in the Lebanese political system.
The rationale of the new electoral system provided for by Law No. 44 of June 17, 2017, is to project internally the external equilibria which ensure unity and funding to the Lebanese State.
With a view to avoiding further chaos, after Michel Aoun’s election, all the electoral districts and constituencies were designed to preserve and stabilize the traditional religious-sectarian electorate.
In fact, electoral law No. 44/2017 divides the country into fifteen major electoral constituencies, further divided into 26 cazas, namely minor electoral districts, thus putting together the classic proportional representation system with a mechanism defined by the specific “preferential voting.”
This means that each voter shall vote for one of the competing lists and shall be entitled to cast one preferential vote for a candidate of the same list he/she has chosen.
This voting system selects candidates only within the caza, the first and smallest electoral district.
The vote is valid only if the preferential votes are cast in all fifteen regional constituencies – with the electoral quotient determined by the number of voters in a given constituency divided by the number of seats already allocated for that constituency.
The preferential voting, however, defines the ranking – hence the winner at caza level.
In other words – as is also the case with Western Europe – this happens to create a sort of electoral elite as against the mass of irrelevant representatives.
Therefore, the Lebanese system creates a hidden electoral bonus, but only for the best-known candidates.
Nonetheless, the real issue is another one: the division is currently within the March 14 Alliance, with the Sunni, Druse and Christian side opposing the Syrian designs on Lebanon, as against the March 8 Alliance that is increasingly linked to the Syrian regime and its external supporters.
Hence, the local paradoxes of a now clear geopolitical framework: Samir Geagea’s “Lebanese Forces” are hostile to the Syrian-Iranian axis and close to Saudi Arabia, but are allied with the Free Democratic Movement of Aoun and his son-in-law Bassil, who have instead signed a written contract with Hezbollah.
Therefore, the political system in Lebanon is reaffirming and maintaining the destabilization of the country indefinitely. It brings back memories.
