Miqati Rejects Cabinet of ‘Cantons’ amid Freeze in Contacts
Premier-designate Najib Miqati has stressed that he would not form a government of “cantons” or grant portfolios to political parties in order to turn them into “feudal” entities.
“I told everyone without exception and not only the general (Michel Aoun) as is being rumored, to give me lists of portfolios that they are seeking and lists of names that they suggest so that I would distribute the portfolios on the names in accordance with my authorities and the authorities of the president,” Miqati was quoted as saying by al-Akhbar daily on Tuesday.
He said that he had agreed with Speaker Nabih Berri, Progressive Socialist Party leader Walid Jumblat and Marada movement chief Suleiman Franjieh on their shares in the new cabinet. But he has yet to clinch a deal with Free Patriotic Movement leader Michel Aoun.
“Hizbullah is ready to give (me) a list of its candidates for the government but is now united in solidarity with the head of the FPM,” Miqati said.
An Nahar daily said that contacts between Miqati on one hand and the envoys of the speaker, Hizbullah and the FPM on the other were frozen, making it difficult to assess whether new attempts aimed at reviving consultations would succeed.
“What would I be doing in the premiership if I tell a certain team to name the minister it wants for the portfolio it wants?” Miqati wondered in his remarks to al-Akhbar, stressing that his constitutional authorities would be useless if the political parties impose on them the ministers and the portfolios.
“The Taef Accord is the only authority that we should resort to,” Miqati said.
On the visit of U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs Jeffrey Feltman last week, Miqati said that the diplomat told him “I am not here to give you instructions; I will tell you what I’ve told the president, I don’t have any link with your cabinet or makeup.”
“Feltman’s stance is not new,” he said, adding that he has been hearing the same statements since his nomination four months ago.
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