Tracy Chamoun announced her candidacy for president at a press conference in Beirut on Monday. (Mohamad El Chamaa/L'Orient Today)
BEIRUT — Tracy Chamoun, Lebanon’s former Ambassador to Jordan and granddaughter of former President Camille Chamoun, declared her candidacy for president at a press conference on Monday afternoon, promising to address the ongoing financial crisis.
Here’s what we know:
• Chamoun, who comes from a family of politicians, is the only woman so far to have joined this year’s presidential race. “I was born a woman, there was no political inheritance for me. I had to work for everything,” she said in a film presented at Monday’s press conference.
• On the economy, she said that as president she would improve trade relations with foreign countries, including those in the Gulf, approve a national budget and build a productive knowledge-based economy. Chamoun did not have many comments on the bank crisis, except that authorities must find a solution for depositors and retirees who have been unable to access their funds. Chamoun did say that she would approve a new salary scale for public employees. She added that she would work to stem the brain drain from Lebanon, including in health sector, and revive the tourism sector.
• Chamoun added that, amid the financial crisis, Syrian refugees in Lebanon “pose a burden on the Lebanese people and must be sent back to their country as quickly as possible.” For Palestinian refugees, there should be “a sustainable policy that would guarantee their rights for the return [to their country].”
• As president, Chamoun would support the Army and security services and ensure the independence of the judiciary, she said. She also took a dig at Hezbollah: “Just as no one group can rule Lebanon, no one group should be able to declare war and peace.”
• Chamoun resigned as Lebanon’s Ambassador to Jordan in the wake of the Aug. 4 Beirut port blast. She previously ran unsuccessfully for Parliament in 2018. She is the daughter of the late Dany Chamoun, leader of the right-wing nationalist Tigers Militia. Dany, his wife and two of their children were assassinated in1990. Her grandfather was Camille Chamoun, who served as Lebanon’s president from 1952 to 1958.