A polling station in Beirut during the May 15, 2022 legislative elections. (Credit: Ibrahim Amro/AFP/File Photo)
BEIRUT — The Lebanese Forces (LF) and the Free Patriotic Movement (FPM) had a tense exchange Friday and Saturday over Lebanon's municipal elections, whose fate remains uncertain due the apparent unwillingness of many parties to see the vote take place.
While Samir Geagea accused the Aounist party and the Moumanaa axis (pro-Iranian in Lebanon) of wanting to "torpedo" the vote, the party led by Gebran Bassil pointed to logistical obstacles hindering the polls.
Two decisive meetings to discuss the elections are scheduled for Tuesday: caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati has scheduled a cabinet meeting to discuss the financing of municipal elections, among other matters. This meeting will take place a few hours after a legislative session called by the Speaker of the Parliament, Nabih Berri, to discuss a possible postponement of the vote due to lack of funding.
The FPM has indicated that, although it opposes the idea of a legislative session during a period of presidential vacancy, it would participate in a meeting concerned municipal elections. This double call comes at a time when the executive and legislative branches of government have been for weeks passing the buck to make a decision whether to release funds to organize the polls or to postpone them.
During a meeting in Bkirki with Maronite Patriarch Bechara al-Rai Thursday, caretaker Interior Minister Bassam Mawlawi reiterated that elections should proceed, denouncing a "political will" behind the failure to meet this deadline.
Several observers claim that some parties do not want these elections to proceed because they have lost lost popularity since the 2022 legislative elections.
'Torpedo the municipal elections'
"The parliamentary groups that want to torpedo the municipal elections, namely those of the Moumanaa axis and the FPM, say that, on one hand, the Ministry of Interior is not able to meet this deadline, and that, on the other hand, the necessary funding has not been secured," Geagea said in a statement Friday. He claimed that these two points "are not valid," given that Mawlawi said Thursday in Bkirki that his ministry was "ready and able to hold the elections on time if the necessary funding is secured."
"The Parliamentary bureau [comprised of Berri, Bou Saab and four other MPs], the parliamentary groups of the Moumanaa and the FPM wanted to preempt the cabinet meeting scheduled for Tuesday afternoon and decided to hold a parliamentary session on the morning of the same day, in order to block the way for cabinet to provide the necessary funding for the election," said the Christian leader.
For Geagea, whose party was among the more successful in the May 2022 parliamentary elections, "what is happening is a fraud, carried out by these groups in order to block municipal elections and those of the mokhtars," local elected officials in charge of some grassroots administrative tasks.
Geagea also made a dig at the FPM, which has repeatedly accused the caretaker prime minister of assuming the prerogatives of the head of state by convening cabinet — Lebanon has experieinced a double vacancy in the executive since the end of Michel Aoun's presidential term last October.
"The FPM bloc," he said, "which has opposed any cabinet meeting, even those devoted to urgent issues, accepts that parliament meets for a subject that is not urgent and for a non-existent reason, which is the financing of the municipal elections, an issue that cabinet has planned to address."
Caretaker cabinet, parliament in office
In response, the FPM's media committee said "the position of Samir Geagea contradicts the position of the LF MPs who had announced, during various meetings of the parliamentary committees, that the ministry of the interior and state bodies were not ready to hold the municipal elections."
"Cabinet has resigned and has no right to meet while Parliament is in session, "said the party said in its statement, adding, "We said we are in favor of necessary legislation. We must not compare a caretaker cabinet to a parliament that's officially in office."
The FPM said that "the problem is not only the funding but the fact that the state is not ready to organize the election, because of the strike of teachers and judges [who are respectively responsible for overseeing the voting process and tabulating votes] and the closure of some administrative offices."
"The FPM is ready for the municipal elections and has already launched its internal electoral machine and its candidacy mechanism," the party said in its own defense, while its detractors believe that the party — increasingly isolated on the local scene and losing popularity — would benefit from the postponement of municipal elections.
Unconstitutional" meeting of Parliament
The LF response was swift. The party's press office said Saturday that Geagea and the LF MPs want the elections to take place "to ensure a political renewal at the local level." It also considered that "in accordance with the constitution, a resigned cabinet can meet to manage exceptional and urgent issues."
"In the context of a deadline as important as the municipal elections," the text continued, "the cabinet must meet to ensure the necessary funding."
The LF also remarked upon the FPM media committee's speaking on behalf of the outgoing interior minister. "Should we believe the FPM or the minister of interior? We certainly believe the minister since he is the one who knows best about the topic," said the text. The LF considered the meeting of Parliament to be "unconstitutional since the House is an electoral body," according to the constitution, in the absence of an elected president.
The FPM mocked the LF Saturday, wondering whether anyone should, "believe the words of Samir Geagea or George Adwan," the head of the LF parliamentary group who blamed the government for the cancellation of municipal elections and all that resulted from it. "Everything we tried to do for four months was just promises and posturing from the government," Adwan had said at the end of a meeting of joint parliamentary committees. "All that was false. They have not done anything serious to ensure the holding of elections."
'Premeditated' blockage
The FPM still insisted that state bodies are not ready to organize the elections on schedule, recalling that the LF, which is not represented in Mikati's caretaker cabinet, had "participated in seven legislative sessions between 2014 and 2016 in the midst of a presidential vacancy."
Samir Geagea personally reacted to these remarks early Saturday afternoon, recalling that "caretaker minister of interior has repeatedly assured [us] that he is ready at the administrative and logistical levels to hold municipal elections if the necessary funding is secured."
Geagea said it is clear that "the parliamentary groups of the Moumanaa and the FPM block the municipal and mokhtar elections in a premeditated manner for one reason: they are afraid of the results."
