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  • BEIRUT: Powerless' candidates set to take on dominant lists

    'Powerless' candidates set to take on dominant lists
    By Adnan El-Ghoul

    The Daily Star/Leb
    Wednesday, May 18, 2005

    BEIRUT: Former Premier Omar Karami, Zghorta MP Suleiman Franjieh,
    General Michel Aoun and many other Lebanese politicians all seem
    "powerless" in face of the present electoral alliances: Amal with
    Hizbulllah, and Saad Hariri's Future Movement with Walid Jumblatt's
    Progressive Socialist Party. Described as "bulldozers" by the Lebanese
    public, these alliances, created collectively or separately, are
    likely to prevent the possibility of genuine political reform in the
    near future.

    Nevertheless, many of these "powerless" candidates have decided to
    meet the challenge in order to truly reflect the voters' ambitions
    and choices.

    In Beirut, sitting MPs Adnan Araqji, Beshara Merhej and former MP
    Najah Wakim will run in the elections and are looking for support
    from Al-Jamaa al-Islamiyya, which has no candidate in Beirut.

    To confront Hariri, these political figures and others will concentrate
    on exploiting apparent "gaps" in the list, and may attempt to incite
    excluded Beiruti families against Hariri.

    Another plan might be to attack the Hariri list's two controversial
    Christian candidates, Gebran Tueni and Solange Gemayel, portraying
    them as the wrong people for the job,  especially given Gemayel's
    recent statement following her uncontested victory, where she claimed
    to have won "thanks to Ghattas Khoury's withdrawal."

    Gemayel declared at the Maronite Patriarchate in Bkirki that she would
    not commit herself politically to Hariri's parliamentary bloc, and
    she reiterated her opposition to all those she considers "strangers"
    - an old civil- war phrase that might be considered "provocative
    language" to many Muslims. Critics say Gemayel should have waited
    until Hariri's list had passed the election test before making such
    "embarrassing" statements.

    The Armenian community in Beirut is also unsatisfied with Hariri's
    alliances, which "ignored the Armenian political groups and selected
    uncommitted members from their community." In a news conference,
    the Tashnag Party called on members and supporters to boycott the
    elections and "stay at home on May 29" .

    In the North, the "opposition" alliance formed by the Future Movement,
    Qornet Shehwan, the Lebanese Forces and the Tripoli Bloc is very
    close to announcing a final list, with potential members posing for
    photographers Tuesday.

    In face of this "powerful" coalition, Karami and Franjieh are
    still considering their "final changes" before announcing their list
    Thursday. Aoun is expected to be the "envisioned rescuer" and Al-Jamaa
    al-Islamiyya the "badly needed catalyst to making up the difference."

    In the South, independent candidates are running with little hope of
    winning .

    "We want to send a message, a political statement that we object to
    the confiscation of the people's will," said one leftist activist.

    The Democratic Forum and the Democratic Left Movement are to field a
    limited list of candidates in Nabatieh's second electoral district;
    they are considering whether to include Nadim Salim from the Democratic
    Renewal Bloc and Ziad Aswad of the Free Patriotic Movement.

    The Communist Party and the Democratic Labor Party led by Elias Abu
    Rizk are forming separate lists of left-wing politicians who seem
    unable to unite even now, in these "hard times."

    The traditional Asaad family is also plagued by division, with a father
    running against a son, and a distant cousin running against both.

    Former Parliament Speaker Kamel al-Assad will compete for the Shiite
    seat in the South's second district with his son Ahmad and two other
    candidates representing Amal and Hizbullah.

    In the Chouf and Baabda-Aley, Aoun, Talal Arslan, Dory Chamoun's
    National Liberal Party and the Syrian Social Nationalist Party are
    still struggling to conclude a meaningful alliance to oppose Jumblatt
    and his alliance with the LF.

    --Boundary_(ID_HqTXq85sD3KvFXq+4pKCwg)--
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