The Constitutional Council in Beirut. (Credit: NNA)
BEIRUT — Tens of activists from the group “Revolutionary Platform of Mount Lebanon” held a sit-in at the Constitutional Council in Beirut on Tuesday to ask the institution not to examine the Free Patriotic Movement’s request to invalidate electoral law amendments for the 2022 parliamentary elections.
Here’s what we know:
• The activists were received by the Constitutional Council president, Judge Tannous Mechleb, to whom they submitted a petition with 15,000 signatures.
• The Lebanese Parliament had voted on amendments to the electoral law that changed the electoral district in which diaspora’s votes were counted from six allotted MPs to the entirety of Parliament.
• The amendments also changed the election date to March 27 to avoid campaigning during the month Ramadan, when many Muslims fast from dawn to sundown.
• The FPM had submitted a demand to invalidate the amendments to the Constitutional Council on Nov. 17. If the demand is accepted, next year’s parliamentary elections would need to take place in May. If not, the actual date of the elections remains at the discretion of Interior Minister Bassam Mawlawi, who needs to co-sign the decree signaling the call to vote with Premier Najib Mikati and President Michel Aoun. The latter has said he will refuse to sign if the elections are scheduled for March.