Mustaqbal, LF Stress Close Ties after Geagea Presidential Bid

إقرأ هذا الخبر بالعربية W460

A meeting held between head of al-Mustaqbal movement leader Saad Hariri's adviser and Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea following his candidacy to the presidential elections was to confirm the “strong ties” between the allies.

According to al-Joumhouria newspaper published on Monday, Nader al-Hariri and Geagea's meeting “came at a time to stress the strong ties between the factions of the independent move and the consultations between them.”

Sources close to the LF expressed relief over the meeting.

Geagea was the first to announce his candidacy to the presidential elections last week.

President Michel Suleiman's six-year term ends in May but the Constitution states that the parliament should choose a new head of state within a two-month period before the end of the incumbent's term, which was on March 25.

“Geagea's contacts with the March 14 allies are open in order to reach common grounds concerning the presidential polls,” the sources added.

The daily reported that the two officials stressed that the March 14 alliance will run for presidency “with one candidate only.”

Deputy LF leader MP George Adwan said that “the party's allies had previous knowledge about Geagea's candidacy.”

“The battle is between two programs in the country.”

Contacts are ongoing between the March 14 Christian parties to prepare a unified stance before tackling the matter with the rest of their allies, An Nahar newspaper said.

Lebanese media have in recent weeks identified other presidential hopefuls as Kataeb party leader and ex-president Amin Gemayel, MPs Boutros Harb and Robert Ghanem, who are like Geagea members of the March 14 anti-Syria movement.

Other potential candidates are Hizbullah allies Free Patriotic Movement leader MP Michel Aoun and Marada Movement leader MP Suleiman Franjieh.

Lebanese presidents are always chosen from the Christian Maronite community.

- H. K.

- G. K.

Comments 37
Missing baba_oreily 07 April 2014, 08:45

10,452

Thumb .mowaten. 07 April 2014, 10:59

"Nader al-Hariri"? was he elected as well? funny, that name sounds familiar :)

Thumb ice-man 07 April 2014, 11:10

@mowaten: How many votes did the Sayyed get in the last elections, remind me please.

Thumb ice-man 07 April 2014, 12:10

@Jaafar: Kate is an American and as such is not allowed to vote in the local Lebanese elections. Listen friend; I have been meaning to show my support for you but never had a chance. Being unemployed with a broken family and feeling like nobody cares about you are quite understandable feelings according to family counselors. There are many therapy groups who could really help you regain some of that self-esteem that you most definitely need at this critical stage of your life. Remember, I am always here to help and guide you through this lonely stage of your life. You can count on me dear friend....!

Thumb .mowaten. 07 April 2014, 13:10

ice-boy: 54.5% of lebanese voted for m8, of which he is one of the main figures.
and he didnt get there because he is the "son of" or "brother of" :)

Missing baba_oreily 07 April 2014, 08:45

10,452

Thumb geha 07 April 2014, 08:46

although Geagea has no chance to get the presidency at this stage, he is the most representative among Christians:
- Amine Gemayel does not have that much support on the ground
- frangieh , being the Syrian representative that he is will never be a president in Lebanon. maybe in Syria :)
- as for aoun, he knows that if elections are to held now, he would not get half the parliament seats he has currently. and that is a fact, based on several polls that have been carried on lately, including the periodic one run by the fpm :) the latest showed they would not get the third of their current seats.

Default-user-icon sempre (Guest) 07 April 2014, 09:22

Lol geha

Thumb .mowaten. 07 April 2014, 11:00

lol, i bet you have a link for those claims?

Thumb ice-man 07 April 2014, 11:08

@mowaten: How do you do it?!!!!!!! How can you vote 12 times in a row? You are simply amazing;-)

Thumb .mowaten. 07 April 2014, 13:11

get a life iceboy

Thumb ice-man 07 April 2014, 11:09

@Jaafar: Do you think they will find MH370 pinger in Dahieh?

Thumb ice-man 07 April 2014, 12:14

@Jaafar: He is well taken care of but I must commend you for caring so much about @Popeye. He really likes you too, perhaps not as much as I do.

Missing coolmec 07 April 2014, 09:21

so what are you trying to say geha?

Thumb geha 07 April 2014, 09:49

what I always said: none of these four will reach the presidency :)

Default-user-icon hanoun (Guest) 07 April 2014, 10:01

let the president be voted by the people at least the president will represent the popular vote not the agents and stooges and corrupt member of parliament
long live democracy

Default-user-icon fouad (Guest) 07 April 2014, 10:25

what about ZIad Baroud? he's been out of the spotlight for a while.....

Default-user-icon hanoun (Guest) 07 April 2014, 12:29

they are afraid from Mr ziad barroud cause if he is president he will put riffi in jail for desobeidiance

Thumb -phoenix1 07 April 2014, 12:35

Hanoun, the old guard is scared stiff of the new faces. People like Ziad Baroud and Demianos Kattar it's clear will never make it to the top post, for the simple fact that they are clean and straight. What makes the matter so truly sad is not only coming from the old guard that will do its utmost to bar them from entering the presidency, but more so those people whom it seems prefer to keep their old guard at all costs, even if it had to bring them down to destitution. We are Lebanese after all, we should get used to having 75% of our population braindead.

Thumb -phoenix1 07 April 2014, 13:19

Hi Roar, good weekend I hope? Now that we are talking of a strong president, do you have any names in mind? Please if you do, kindly post them, coz this is no joke, we need a strong president, one who is decisive, capable of taking difficult decisions and especially one that cannot be bought whatsoever. We need one who is persistent and consistent, so that leaves us with no choice but strike out the old guard, from Geagea, Aoun, Gemayel and Frangieh.

Thumb -phoenix1 07 April 2014, 16:43

Roar, would you believe that I've stopped watching F1, terrible new rules, Bernie must go if this sport is to live.

Thumb -phoenix1 07 April 2014, 12:40

I am LF and will remain LF to my last days, but truth be told, Samir Geagea is the wrong person for the presidency. Now I will not accommodate hypocrisy by those who still claim that he is a criminal because Geagea is exactly the same like those he faced during the war, all of them, unexceptionally are as criminal as him. But that's besides the point, a man who hails from our wartime era cannot enjoy impartiality, no matter how much he will try. I agree, we need a firm president, one that has courage to take stands, but also one that is not tainted by war or blood. Lebanon is a country of open wounds, thus, a new president needs to come with no wounds of his own, if he is to lead over all the nation. It saddens me profoundly to note that we Lebanese will never learn anything, in fact nothing whatsoever.

Thumb .mowaten. 07 April 2014, 13:17

phoenix all who took part in the civil war have blood on their hands, yes, but not all committed war crimes. how many people did geagea assassinate, murder and execute summarily? how many people are there in those containers in the waters outside beirut port? how many women were raped and murdered under his eyes by his men?

sorry but his crimes are nowhere to be compared with others. Noboy can say Aoun had his rivals assassinated, or that he mass murdered civilians, or that the Lebanese army applied extortion and rape as common practice.
and as for the ultimate betrayal, please remember that geagea helped the syrian troops enter, because he was losing against Aoun. this man should have never gotten out of his cell.

Thumb -phoenix1 07 April 2014, 16:38

Mowaten dear brother, in general what you said is OK, but then I hate to disagree with you again. It is my view, that all of the warlord have blood on their hands, it is also my view that they committed serious assassinations and crime, all of them, not just geagea but all of them, but for the sake of washing our laundry at home, I will not state names. Please, between family that is.

Thumb -phoenix1 07 April 2014, 16:41

FD, with all dues respects, everyone in Lebanon, at one time or the other was made to work with the Syrians. Even us LF, during the days of Bachir Gemayel, we had to work with the Syrians to liberate Tall El Za3tar and other Palestinian camps. At the time we were too weak yet, but the focus should be on the Syrian instead of the Lebanese, he, the Syrian was the one who was capable of calling the shots, all the shots. So to put blame on one side alone is to show only one side of the coin, fact is, everyone in Lebanon worked with the Syrian, but it is the Syrian that never remained consistent. For trial, let today either Sayed Hassan or Aoun take one position against the interests of Syria, even today, and you will see how both will fly high.

Missing peace 07 April 2014, 14:09

seems M8ers have their hard on as usual whenever there's an article about geagea...

how comic they are

Missing peace 07 April 2014, 15:22

sure just repeating what your beloved FT chiwawa says about those posting against aoun.... so thx, your friend is weird... never doubted that LOL

Missing peace 07 April 2014, 16:01

poor thing... can't even assume his own words... pityful chiwawa...

Thumb Mystic 07 April 2014, 15:55

This is no surprise.

Thumb beiruti 07 April 2014, 16:22

This is clearly a blocking move by Geagea. Aoun's push to become the next President is stymied by Hezbollah's failure to support the bid. Hezbollah does not want a competing source of power and Aoun, with 24 Deputies in Parliament would be such competition. So Aoun is looking to KSA and its benefactor in Lebanon, Mustaqbel. Future saying that it will support Geagea freezes Aoun out, which is the objective.

Thumb beiruti 07 April 2014, 16:25

Geagea is actually the more attractive candidate for Hezbollah. The LF has a smaller Parliamentary bloc and by elevating Geagea to the Presidency, it puts distance between the LF and M14. With no other major Christian party to its side, M14 gets marginalized and that is an objective of Hezbollah. But, alas, Geagea cannot become elected either. He will need Jumblatt and all of M14 to come with him and he is not a consensus candidate among the Christian electorate.
Geagea however, I do not believe, harbors ambitions to be President, but to be a President Maker. He can do more for having cleared the way for Ziyad Barouk than he could by becoming President himself.

Thumb -phoenix1 07 April 2014, 17:10

Beiruti, bro, I am a big fan of yours, I love and I enjoy your every single post. Every time I read any of your posts, I come out of it a bit better educated, thanks a lot bro.

Thumb beiruti 07 April 2014, 19:52

Phoenix1, I am a fan of your posts as well, including the picture you have selected. I met Bachir in Washington DC in August 1981 where his talk had the people standing on the tables in the room cheering for him. I met him and he was like my brother. Nice choice you made.

Thumb -phoenix1 08 April 2014, 00:41

Hi Beiruti brother, Bachir was my boss and my teacher and to the end of my life he shall continue to be my role model. My only worry brother is Bani the gay from the Shouf, when he reads this post of mine, he will suffer a heart-attack or a stroke.

Thumb -phoenix1 07 April 2014, 17:14

Bani, a new skeleton again?

Thumb -phoenix1 07 April 2014, 17:31

Bani Maarouf, you and your love of Geagea again?

Missing dcnzogh 08 April 2014, 03:50

Ya Habibi, What a beautiful picture! Are their any doctors among you commentators who can prescribe some HEAVY-DUTY anti vomiting drugs. I may never be able to keep down another meal.