UNVEILING OF FUTURE’S BEIRUT LIST AWAITS TASHNAG TALKS
Mohammed Zaatari

The Daily Star
May 4, 2010 Tuesday
Lebanon

BEIRUT/SIDON: While Sidon’s consensus candidate announced Monday
his 21-member-list, the Future Movement delayed unveiling its list
in Beirut until Tuesday, giving a chance for talks with the Tashnag
party. During a meeting with a delegation from the "Future Youth,"
Prime Minister Saad Hariri stressed his commitment to the parity
between

BEIRUT/SIDON: While Sidon’s consensus candidate announced Monday his
21-member-list, the Future Movement delayed unveiling its list in
Beirut until Tuesday, giving a chance for talks with the Tashnag party.

During a meeting with a delegation from the "Future Youth," Prime
Minister Saad Hariri stressed his commitment to the parity between
Muslims and Christians in the distribution of seats in the capital’s
municipal council.

"We call on Beirutis to endorse this formula and not to listen to
attempts by some parties to break this balance under misleading
slogans," he said.

Hariri urged Beirut "to participate in the electoral process of
choosing members of the capital’s municipal council, given the
repercussions [it will have] on the future of the city."

Media reports said Monday there was an increasing likelihood that
the Armenian Tashnag party would join forces with the Free Patriotic
Movement (FPM) in Beirut’s electoral battle scheduled for Sunday.

On Monday, Tashnag MP Hagop Pakrodounian met with Hariri and told
the Central News Agency the final decision was in the "hands of the
party and will be made within 24 hours."

Meanwhile, Future Movement MP Amar Houri stressed that talks with
the FPM over Beirut’s municipal polls could only take place with the
Christian MPs of the district. Beirut’s Christian MPs are all members
of the parliamentary majority.

However, the head of FPM’s economic committee Nicolas Sehnaoui who
is taking part in negotiations said that "Christian MPs with whom we
are negotiating are denying us our rights."

"We demand a share equal to what we gained in the parliamentary polls,"
he added.

While Sehnaoui acknowledged the difficulty of winning the competition
in Beirut amid the "current electoral law," he voiced the FPM’s
readiness to engage in an electoral battle in the capital.

Houri voiced his movement’s insistence on consensus" based on logical
and acceptable demands." and said: "While we extend our hands to them,
we prepare ourselves for a battle."

Separately, Sidon’s consensus candidate Mohammad al-Saudi announced
his list dubbed "Consensus and Development List of Sidon" in a news
conference he held at his house in nearby Hlaliya.

Municipal polls will be held in Sidon on May 23.

Treating environmental problems in Sidon, building new schools, taking
care of the city’s archaeological sites, erecting public gardens,
developing the port, reducing unemployment, giving momentum to the
role played by women and youth were among the main goals Saudi said
his list would seek.

Asked about objections made by former MP Osama Saad that the consensus
list didn’t represent all sectors in Sidon, Saudi said that the
municipal council had no "political color," adding that development
was the only goal it sought.

When asked about reasons for excluding Al-Jamaa al-Islamiyya from
his list, Saudi said that the movement decided not to participate in
a bid to facilitate Saudi’s mission.

But head of Al-Jamaa al-Islamiyya’s political bureau Ali Ammar said
the fact that Saudi’s list was not based on consensus will push his
party to create an opposing list allied to the other political parties
in the city.

"Isn’t the Future Movement which is the main supporter of the list
a political faction?" he asked in a telephone call with Elnashra
news website.

Meanwhile, national and Islamic Lebanese parties of Sidon, which
convened in Saad’s office, expressed their dissatisfaction with the
platform of Saudi’s list, adding that MP Bahia Hariri and the Future
Movement have pressured Saudi to incorporate some of their supporters
in his list.

According to the local parties of Sidon, Saudi broke his promise
to form a list of independent candidates taking into consideration
political and social equilibriums of the city. – With additional
reporting by Nafez Qawas.