Deputy Parliament Speaker Elias Bou Saab at the end of the meeting of the joint committees, April 12, 2023. (Credit: Hossam Chbaro)
BEIRUT — Deputy Parliament Speaker Elias Bou Saab urged Tuesday for "dialogue" between various parties to end Lebanon's presidential vacuum, now entering its seventh month.
Former President Michel Aoun's term ended on Oct. 31 with no successor in place.
Bou Saab's comments Tuesday came after a meeting with Maronite Patriarch Bechara al-Rai in Bkirki. The deputy Parliament speaker added that he was dissatisfied with the deadlock surrounding electing a new president.
Parliament has attempted 11 times since September 2022 to elect a head of state, each session ending with no winner.
"Dialogue is essential," insisted Bou Saab Tuesday, the latest in a series of meetings this past week with political actors across Lebanon.
Bou Saab said the meetings were not held from a "partisan perspective, but rather in [his] capacity as deputy Parliament speaker."
"I felt the patriarch's displeasure with the situation we have reached. The officials who dealt with this issue have not shown interest in the time factor, which greatly disturbs the patriarch," he said in a statement.
"We have not yet begun to discuss names of presidential candidates because the parties have not managed to support a common candidate following the initiative launched by the patriarch," Bou Saab added.
In early April, Rai convened more than 50 Christian MPs in a "spiritual" day in Harissa north of Beirut and asked them about their efforts "to facilitate the election of a president.”
This initiative came as the Christian political camp remained divided in the face of Amal and Hezbollah, which recently announced their support for the Marada Movement leader Sleiman Frangieh. However, the latter is facing a Christian veto.
Bou Saab later met with the Renewal parliamentary group, led by the independent Zgharta MP Michel Moawad, who has been a frontrunner presidential candidate.
"I saw convergences between us," Bou Saab said following the meeting. "The region is moving towards change and openness."
Moawad said that Bou Saab's initiative "is based on a sound principle," adding that he supports "the solution based on a logic of recovery of the state and partnership."
Bou Saab also met in recent days with the head of the Hezbollah parliamentary bloc Mohammad Raad. Later on Tuesday, he also met with Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea at that party's headquarters in Maarab.
The meeting, which lasted an hour and a half, "was excellent," announced Bou Saab, in remarks reported by the state-run National News Agency.
"I perceived an openness on the part of the LF leader and a commitment to the commonalities between the Lebanese," he added.
"It is important to continue the dialogue with all parties. We agreed with Samir Geagea to continue our consultations after this tour," said Bou Saab.
When asked about his earlier meeting with Mohammad Raad and its commonalities with his meeting with Geagea, Bou Saab expressed his "reassurance" after his visit to Maarab. "There are many converging points of view and we can try to make them evolve," he said.
On Monday, the United States called for the election of a "non-corrupt" president in order to "unite the country and quickly implement the reforms needed to bring its economy out of crisis."
Lebanon is in the midst of an economic crisis of historic proportions that has seen the national currency lose much of its value since 2019 and citizens lose their bank savings.