Adib Vows 'Govt. of Experts' after Talks with MPs
Prime Minister-designate Mustafa Adib on Wednesday pledged to form a "government of experts" to spearhead reforms demanded by France and the rest of the international community as well as by the vast majority of the Lebanese people.
"We hope that we will quickly succeed in forming a government made up of a coherent team that is focused on dealing with the many dossiers before us," Adib said in a televised statement that followed non-binding consultations with the parliamentary blocs in Ain el-Tineh.
"We will proceed from the principle that the government should be a government of experts," he added, noting that such a government would "regain the confidence of the Lebanese people and the Arab and international communities."
He refused to take any questions, saying "now is the time for working not for talking."
His announcement came after a high-profile visit by Emmanuel Macron during which the French president said political leaders had agreed on a reform road map involving a government being put together within two weeks, following last month's devastating blast in the port of Beirut.
The last government resigned in the face of public anger over the August 4 explosion that killed at least 190, wounded thousands and laid waste to entire districts of the capital.
Government formation is usually a drawn-out process in multi-confessional Lebanon where a complex political system seeks to share power between different religious groups.
But the country's deadliest peacetime disaster has created intense pressure for swift reforms to lift it out of its worst economic crisis in decades.
Analyst Karim Bitar said that, considering the unusual speed with which the prime minister was nominated, Lebanon could have a new government within the next few weeks.
"Everyone in Lebanon now realizes that we no longer have the luxury of time, that the clock is ticking," he said.
"I do think that the French pressure will lead to some forms of change in the short term because Lebanon is in such a difficult financial" situation, but such changes risked being only "cosmetic reforms," he said.
"I very much doubt that they... would accept the structural reforms, the systemic reforms that Lebanon desperately needs because that would mean their own disappearance ultimately," he added, referring to the political establishment.
A protest movement, which has taken to the streets since last October demanding the ouster of the political elite, has already rejected Adib's nomination on principle.
They allege he is too close to a political class whose alleged corruption and incompetence they blame for the explosion of a large shipment of ammonium nitrate that had languished at Beirut's port for years.
Source: Agence France Presse, Naharnet
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