Naharnet

Report: Jumblat Observes Four-Party Election Talks in Silence, Awaits Outcome

After the recent four-party meeting at the Baabda Palace which deliberated the controversial issue of an election law, Progressive Socialist Party leader MP Walid Jumblat is watching with caution what outcome will these meetings bring, al-Joumhouria daily reported Friday.

“Jumblat is carefully watching the path of the election law. He still insists on his position which rejects any law that hints at an abolition, exclusion or marginalization of the Druze community,” sources close to Jumblat told the daily.

The Druze leader is silently watching what the four-party meetings between Hizbullah, al-Mustaqbal, Free Patriotic Movement and AMAL Movement will yield, so that he would take a stance.

On Wednesday, a meeting between the said parties was held at the presidential palace in Baabda where talks focused on the stalled electoral law for the upcoming parliamentary elections.

The meeting was attended by Finance Minister Ali Hassan Khalil of the AMAL Movement, Free Patriotic Movement chief and Foreign Minister Jebran Bassil, Hizbullah MP Ali Fayyad and Prime Minister Saad Hariri's aide Nader Hariri.

The interlocutors assured afterwards, that they discussed a number of formats and it has become certain that there won't be a law that eliminates any of the parties.They also assured that the four parties have not formed “an alliance or a front.”

Political parties are bickering over amending the current election law which divides seats among the different religious sects.

Jumblat's PSP has backed down from its previous support for a hybrid law that mixes the proportional representation and winner-takes-all systems.

The PSP, which is now in favor of the winner-takes-all system, has recently warned that any law containing proportional representation would “marginalize” the minority Druze community.

Hizbullah has repeatedly called for an electoral law fully based on proportional representation but other political parties, especially Mustaqbal and the Progressive Socialist Party, have rejected the proposal, arguing that Hizbullah's weapons would prevent serious competition in the Iran-backed party's strongholds.

Mustaqbal, the Lebanese Forces and the PSP had proposed a hybrid electoral law that mixes the proportional representation and the winner-takes-all systems but the PSP eventually withdrew its support for the proposal.

Speaker Nabih Berri has also proposed a hybrid law.

The country has not voted for a parliament since 2009, with the legislature instead twice extending its own mandate. The 2009 polls were held under an amended version of the 1960 electoral law and the next elections are scheduled for May 2017.

Source: Naharnet


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