More than two years of impasse, twelve parliamentary sessions dedicated to the subject. But for now, Lebanon still lives without a head of state. Its last president, Michel Aoun, left office at the end of October 2022. Since then, despite the economic crisis the country is going through and international pressure, the deputies have not managed to reach an agreement. The impasse was such that for a year and a half, no parliamentary session had taken place to try to appoint a new president. For the first time since June 2023, the President of the House summoned the deputies this Thursday, January 9. And this time, the hopes of an end to the crisis are greater. Interview with Joseph Bahout, director of the Issam Fares Institute of Public Policy and International Affairs at the American University of Beirut.
6 mins
RFI: The last time Lebanese deputies met to try to elect a president was in June 2023. Since then, there has been the war between Hezbollah and Israel from which the Shiite movement emerged weakened. Does this new context favor a way out of the impasse?
Joseph Bahout: It is obvious that the blockages that were there before the Gaza war which began on October 7, 2023, and then the war with the Lebanon from September 2024 have today largely taken on a different nature. I would not say that they are completely smoothed out, but I believe that all the forces today know that the very fragile ceasefire between Lebanon and Israel is particularly due to the completion of the Lebanese institutional building. There must be a president, there must be a government in working order – we have had a government responsible for handling current affairs for two years.
There must be an army capable of deploying to the South. And I believe that the obstacles that some political parties like the Hezbollah or Amal [les deux partis représentant la communauté chiite du pays au Parlement, NDLR] or others continued to erect have now largely fallen due to the change in the regional situation.
For a little over two years, the Quintet – the group of five countries bringing together the United States, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Qatar and France, which intervenes to try to get Lebanon out of the crisis that he crosses – underlined the importance of electing a president because of the disastrous economic situation and the urgency of reforms to be carried out. But today, the Quintet also emphasizes that the security future of Lebanon also depends on this election. Are the stakes even higher for the country?
The stakes are enormous and they are very intertwined. And so many Americans, French and Saudis repeat ad nauseam that there will be no end to the crisis in Lebanon – an end to the financial crisis that the country has been going through for three years, an end to the security crisis for a year and a half – and that there will be no stopping -the lasting fire if there is not the entire institutional architecture in the country. And it begins with the keystone that is the President of the Republic. The president does not have a lot of prerogatives in the Lebanese Constitution, but he is still the head of state. It is the symbol of state unity.
Without it, there cannot be a functioning government today. However, there is a huge financial crisis that has affected the Lebanese since 2018; it requires gigantic structural reforms and therefore very difficult decisions to make. There is also the question of security. Today also that of regional transformations which are gigantic. I will give you just one example: there must be a strong, unified and clear Lebanese power which can, for example, sit down with the new power in Syria to deal with the question of borders, refugees, trafficking. , smuggling, etc. So all these questions are attached to this key which is the election of a President of the Republic.
Also readLebanon: Parliament session on January 9 to elect a President of the Republic
Could the prospect of an imminent change of president in the United States also play a role?
I think it weighs a little implicitly, but not directly. Let’s say that the Lebanese deputies who until now were in a sort of procrastination which is a bit their political culture, realize that we cannot approach today the new world – whether it is the new international world or the new regional world – without having put the Lebanese house in order. So, I think it weighed. It also weighs in the sense that probably – and this is a hypothesis that must be verified – certain forces, which until now thought they could get away with it, are saying to themselves that with Trump, this kind of game will probably not work and that they risk getting into difficulty.
For example, the Speaker of the House, who until then was trying to maneuver, to play smart, has, I believe, received clear signals that the new American administration could put him on the international sanctions list. He has a gigantic fortune, which is obviously due to all the embezzlement he has indulged in. But I think he wants to try to save his skin. Idem for many Lebanese politicians who say to themselves that it is probably better to close this file before a new disruptive element – which is Trump – arrives on the scene.
Is there a consensus emerging today around the candidacy of a personality?
Things have been extremely fluid and volatile in the country for the past two days. But at the risk of being wrong, I think we can say that, as we speak, the consensus seems very largely to be emerging in favor of the commander-in-chief of the army. There are still two or three crucial meetings of political forces that must be held, but they seem to indicate that they are heading towards this vote. Hezbollah can be content not to vote against Joseph Aoun and leave certain deputies who are not members of the party, but who are “allies” the freedom to vote as they want. And they will vote for Joseph Aoun.
So Hezbollah would then be in a position to say: “ I didn’t elect him, but I’m not against him “. These are the bickering of Lebanese politics and it often happens like that. I believe that it was an outcome that we could all have been waiting for for some time, but it was stuck on extremely political maneuvers, sometimes even downright hard bargaining. In Lebanon, votes are for sale and places in the new power are up for negotiation.
Also readLebanon: end of Aoun mandate, marked by political and economic turbulence