Berri Begins Efforts to Expedite Formation of New Govt.
Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri is exerting efforts aimed at expediting the process of naming a new premier and forming a new government, media reports said.
LBCI television cited the meeting that Berri held with Deputy Speaker Elie al-Ferzli on Wednesday, adding that Ferzli “has embarked on an endeavor on the government file and he might hold a meeting with Ali Hassan Khalil and Hussein Khalil.”
The TV network also quoted several sources as saying that “the few coming days will be decisive in terms of the figure that will be tasked with forming the government.”
“The sources agree that (caretaker PM Saad) Hariri is no longer the exclusive candidate for a lot of parties concerned and that there are serious talks over other candidates, although the Shiite duo (Hizbullah and AMAL Movement) is still clinging to Hariri and trying to convince him to form a techo-political government,” LBCI added.
21 November 2019, 03:57
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What is Berri's formal job exactly? In other parliaments, the speaker merely chairs sessions. Berri's informal job seems to be to make it appear the Shia majority of Lebanon has no need for Hezbollah to lead all of Lebanon to post-sectarianism, which is to say, post-colonialism.
Maybe that is correct: since Hezbollah hasn't led the civil protest to abandon the Article 24 set-aside of half of parliamentary seats to Christians, maybe Hezbollah is obsolete. Maybe Lebanon is like the US: they no longer need a military, and the military they ostensibly have is weakening them day by day. I think Hezbollah is much less of a liar than the US military. Maybe, as some joke here, it has spent too much time in a bunker. It needs to get up and stretch its legs and get some sunshine. I think the best thing that could happen to Israel is for Hezbollah to lead Lebanon to post-sectarian stability. Of course, Israel may drop a bomb on Nasrallah so it can go back to sleep.
