Pharaon Meets Aoun as Hakim Slams Christian Ministers who Secured Quorum

Tourism Minister Michel Pharaon of the March 14 camp held talks Thursday with Free Patriotic Movement founder MP Michel Aoun in Rabieh as Resigned Economy Minister Alain Hakim of the Kataeb Party slammed the Christian ministers who attended the controversial cabinet session that was held earlier in the day.

“The issue of the presidency requires further consultations and dialogue in order to reach a package deal, and it requires guarantees at the Christian level and from other parties such as Hizbullah, al-Mustaqbal Movement and some Arab countries,” Pharaon told reporters after the meeting.

“Consultations must not stop and the governmental crises that we have been suffering for more than two years now require exploring means to continue the government's work and cater to the people's needs,” the minister added.

Pharaon also stressed that Aoun is “very keen on all state institutions and on the government,” calling for more dialogue and consultations.

Resigned minister Hakim meanwhile lashed out at the Christian ministers who secured quorum for the cabinet meeting, who included Pharaon.

“We condemn the stance of the Christian ministers who secured the quorum of today's cabinet session and we questions their objectives,” Hakim tweeted.

“Lebanon does not need further dialogue and discussion meetings. If the cabinet's sessions have turned into discussions and dialogue, let it resign and act in caretaker capacity and let us elect a president immediately,” Hakim added, referring to the cabinet session that did not witness any discussion of agenda items.

Earlier in the day, Hakim had warned that “the country is on the verge of collapse economically, politically and socially,” wondering about “the benefit from holding hollow cabinet session.”

“Where is the government's credibility? Resigning is more honorable for it than this farce,” he tweeted.

The cabinet session was held in the absence of the ministers of the FPM, Hizbullah, Marada Movement and Tashnag Party. Kataeb had resigned from the cabinet in June in protest at the government's handling of the waste management crisis.

The FPM has suspended its participation in cabinet sessions and national dialogue meetings over accusations that other parties in the country are not respecting the 1943 National Pact.

The National Pact is an unwritten agreement that set the foundations of modern Lebanon as a multi-confessional state based on Christian-Muslim partnership.

The FPM's latest boycott of cabinet meetings was initially linked to the thorny issue of military and security appointments. The movement has long voiced reservations over the government's decision-taking mechanism in the absence of a president.

The defense minister had recently postponed the retirement of Higher Defense Council chief Maj. Gen. Mohammed Kheir after no consensus was reached over three candidates that he had proposed, angering the FPM which says that it opposes term extensions for all senior officers.

Addressing Prime Minister Tammam Salam on Friday, FPM chief Jebran Bassil said “the son of late PM Saeb Salam must pay great attention when he says that the government is respecting the National Pact when it convenes in the presence of ministers representing only six percent of a main component of the country (Christians).”

Bassil has also warned that the country might be soon plunged into a “political system crisis” if the other parties do not heed the FPM's demands regarding Muslim-Christian “partnership.”

Marada Movement chief MP Suleiman Franjieh hit back at Bassil on Monday, saying Marada and the other Christian parties in the cabinet “represent a lot more than six percent.”