Berri Chairs Parliament Meeting, Reiterates Need to Cut Extension Term Despite Opposition
Lawmakers convened on Tuesday in a parliament session in Nejmeh Square under the chairmanship of Speaker Nabih Berri to tackle 42 items on the agenda in addition to the oil and gas exploration petroleum activities file.
At the beginning of the meeting, Berri announced that his Development and Liberation bloc had submitted a draft law under which the extended term of the current parliament would expire on December 31, 2017 instead of May 21, 2018.
For his part, MP Butros Harb stressed that politicians “must make up their minds otherwise the parliamentary elections will be wasted.”
Democratic Gathering bloc MP Wael Abou Faour also stressed the need to stage the polls, he addressed Berri saying: “We have great confidence in your wisdom and in Hariri's to help stage the polls on time. No political or technical reasons should obstruct them.”
Berri's suggestion was criticized by Foreign Minister Jebran Bassil who argued that such a measure would “harm the reforms” that were introduced with the formation of the country's new electoral law.
According to the Speaker, the draft law stipulates that parliament's term -- which has been extended three times since 2009 -- would expire on December 31, 2017, and that the elections should be held before this date in line with the electoral law's stipulations.
The Cabinet had on Sunday approved a suggestion to upgrade the national identity card into a “biometric identity card” that enables citizens to use their IDs to cast votes in the upcoming parliamentary elections.
The introduction of biometric voting cards was one of the excuses that the legislature had announced in order to extend its own term for a third time.
The upcoming parliamentary elections are slated to be held under a proportional representation electoral law for the first time in Lebanon's history.
Source: Naharnet
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