Govt. tasks ministerial panel with submitting report on electoral law

Cabinet on Wednesday tasked a specialized ministerial committee with submitting, within a week, a report about the electoral law amendments that have been suggested by the foreign and interior ministries.

The aforementioned compromise convinced the Lebanese Forces’ ministers not to walk out of the session, Al-Jadeed TV said.

The TV network reported that Information Minister Paul Morcos, Justice Minister Adel Nassar and the LF ministers exerted efforts with the various ministerial blocs in order to reach a mechanism that would preserve expats’ rights and enjoy ministerial consensus.

Foreign Minister Youssef Rajji of the LF had submitted an urgent bill to cabinet that would allow expats to vote abroad in the 2026 parliamentary elections, after Speaker Nabih Berri refused to put a similar bill on parliament’s agenda.

If approved, the draft law would allow expats to choose their representatives in the 128-seat parliament according to their registered electoral districts, instead of limiting their votes to six newly-introduced seats.

The Foreign Ministry said its move came after it received a number of petitions and letters from a large number of Lebanese expats based in Berlin, Stockholm, Ottawa, Montreal, Washington, New York, Abuja, Madrid, London, Melbourne and Paris, who demanded the abolition of the two articles.

Sixty-five MPs from the parliamentary majority had tried to discuss the amendment of the electoral law in parliament but Berri blocked the attempt.

Expats had voted heavily in favor of the Lebanese Forces and its allies during the 2018 and 2022 parliamentary elections. Hezbollah and the Amal Movement argue that they do not enjoy the same campaigning freedom that the other parties enjoy abroad and have thus deemed the six newly-introduced seats as the lesser of two evils.

Morcos said Wednesday that it is impossible to implement the six-seat system for technical reasons.

The Lebanese Forces, the Kataeb Party and some Change and independent MPs are meanwhile calling for allowing expats to vote for the current 128 seats as happened in the 2018 and 2022 elections. The law had been amended back then to allow for the postponement of the introduction of the six new seats until 2026.