A RECIPE FOR FOMENTING CONFLICT
Mostafa Zein

Dar Al-Hayat
D/05-2008/Article-20080520-06bbfcde-c0a8-10ed-01e2 -5c7323263b34/story.html
May 20 2008
Lebanon

The leaders of Lebanon’s communities have gone to Doha without any
of them having an idea of how to re-establish the political regime
on a comprehensive and national basis. As the representative of his
community, each leader is aspiring to obtain the biggest number of
advantages and benefits to the detriment of the other leaders. Genius
as they are, all parties have revived the 1960 electoral law, a move
naturally accompanied by many disputes. Lebanon today is not the same
as it was in the 1960s. It has undergone many changes, most importantly
the 15-year civil war, whose active elements remain intact even today.

The 1960 law was tailor-made for the political class of that
time. In the absence of a census, Christians received 54 seats and
Muslims 45. Lebanon was divided into 26 districts, based on the
Qadaa (county). Two districts were merged in some governorates. The
division or merger of districts either favored the candidate close to
the president (Fouad Chehab) or worked to defeat his rival. Beirut
was divided into three districts, to guarantee the election of the
leader of the Maronite Phalange Party, Pierre Gemayel, and exclude
former President Camille Chamoun. Gemayel was elected thanks to the
votes of the Armenians. To placate Kamal Jumblatt, the Druze leader
and strong ally of the president, four districts were merged in the
Chouf – Baaqlin, Joun, Deir al-Qamar and Shhim – so that Jumblatt
reached parliament with a big parliamentary bloc (the 1989 law did
not change this division in order to help Walid Jumblatt). The same
goes true for other districts and counties.

The 1960 law, revived by the parties to the Lebanese national
dialogue in Doha, enshrined "political feudalism" on sectarian
foundations. The subsequent amendments further stressed this line,
especially after the Taef Accord leveled out the equation between
Muslims and Christians, once again with no census. As such, the head
of a candidate list generally imposes the candidate he prefers on
the voters; other candidates cannot compete against the list headed
by the speaker. The same goes for the Hezbollah or Hariri lists. In
other words, these leaders, and not the people, become the source
of authority. This is a violation of the Lebanese constitution and
the most basic principles of democracy. Totally subject to the will
of the leaders of blocs, the governments selected by the parliament
represent the blocs’ interests and political orientations, which are
in turn subject to mutual bargains.

In addition, the 1960 and 1989 laws adopted different criteria for
districts. In Beirut District Three, for example, 165,000 voters elect
10 MPs. In Baalbeck-Hermel, 283,000 voters also elect 10 MPs. In Tyre,
130,000 voters select four MPs, all of them Shiites, while the district
has more than 30,000 Christian voters.

In summary, none of the adopted election laws was fair, whether by
the standards of consensual democracy, or by any other internationally
recognized democratic standard. With these laws, the MP’s impunity was
subject to his remaining loyal to the head of his parliamentary bloc,
who derives his strength from the "holiness" of this sect, as well as
from the outside. This impunity allowed the speaker to obstruct the
parliament’s legislative work of late. It allowed the prime minister
to remain in power, even though more than half of the Lebanese have
demonstrated in the street against him, and despite the civil war
that almost broke out two weeks ago.

The negotiations in Doha will re-fashion the country’s political
authority and distribute shares of power to placate this leader or
that, or humor this country or that – if these talks succeed. However,
the political regime that will turn the Lebanese into full-fledged
citizens instead of political appendages is the farthest thing from
the agenda and aspirations of those assembled in Doha. They might
come up with a formula to postpone an explosion, but this is just
setting up a new phase of conflict.