BEIRUT — Progressive Socialist Party MP Akram Chehayeb said Tuesday after a visit to the Lebanese Forces head Samir Geagea that his party will align with the LF in parliamentary elections scheduled on May 15 “in many areas,” the state-run National News Agency reported.
Here’s what we know:
• Chehayeb, who was accompanied by PSP MP Wael Abou Faour, met with Geagea at the latter’s residency in Maarab. Following the meeting, Chehayeb said, “we meet on a joint vision to see our country consist of justice, freedom and dignity for its people [and] not a platform or a field for others.”
• Chehayeb also announced that his party “will align with the Lebanese Forces in the upcoming parliamentary elections in many areas,” but added that the names of candidates in these areas are still under study.
• In the 2018 parliamentary elections, the PSP was allied with the LF and the Future Movement in many areas, including the PSP’s Chouf stronghold. However, Future Movement leader Saad Hariri last week announced his decision to withdraw from politics and requested that his party do the same. Commenting on Hariri’s decision, Chehayeb said, “Hariri has a special situation which we understand, and he is the one we have experienced a lot of national challenges with,” referring to his party’s history of aligning with Hariri’s party in all parliamentary elections since 2005.
• Now with Hariri’s absence, it is unclear with which Sunni representative group the PSP will run, or if the party will name Sunni candidates in an attempt to secure the Sunni parliamentary seats in the districts in which they contest the elections.