Hasan LakkisHussein Dakroub| The Daily Star
BEIRUT: The fate of national dialogue and the government are up in the air following rival leaders’ failure Wednesday to resolve the thorny issue of military promotions, viewed as the key to reviving the role of the executive and legislative branches of power.
During the fifth round of all-party talks chaired by Speaker Nabih Berri, the leaders also failed to make any breakthrough in the 16-month presidential deadlock, underlining the wide gap between the March 8 and March 14 parties over who should be Lebanon’s next president.
The presidential election crisis is the first and main topic on the agenda of national dialogue launched by Berri last month with the aim of reaching an agreement on the election of a president and ending paralysis in Parliament and the Cabinet.
Berri had originally set three consecutive sessions on Oct. 6, 7 and 8 for intensive talks on the presidential deadlock. However, the scrapping of Thursday’s session reflected a lack of progress and lingering differences among the feuding parties over solutions to the presidential crisis and military promotions.
A statement issued Wednesday night following two rounds of talks said the next dialogue session has been set for Oct. 26, thus ruling out the possibility of reaching a deal on the promotions of senior Army officers, before Oct. 15, when Brig. Gen. Shamel Roukoz, MP Michel Aoun’s son-in-law, is due to retire.
The promotion of Roukoz to the rank of major general, meant to keep him in the military along with the chance of being appointed Army commander, is a major demand of Aoun’s Free Patriotic Movement.
A deal on military promotions would set the stage for the resumption of Cabinet and Parliament sessions, stalled by the presidential interregnum. However, the military promotions issue is facing opposition from at least eight ministers in the 24-member Cabinet.
Another reason cited for postponing the dialogue until Oct. 26 was Berri’s official visits to Romania and Geneva beginning next week. Berri’s trip to Geneva is to attend the 31st conference of the Inter-Parliamentary Union.
Despite the scrapping of Thursday’s dialogue session, civil society groups, which have dismissed the all-party talks as “futile,” maintained their call for a mass demonstration on Martyrs’ Square as part of their ongoing campaign against the government and the political class over the failure to resolve the two-month-long trash crisis.
Perhaps MP Walid Jumblatt summed up the dilemma facing the rival leaders best, when he said that a president could not be elected without a full package deal, including the military promotions.
Jumblatt, who walked out early from the evening session due to what he said an appointment with his doctor, said he presented his paper containing the criteria required in a president in an attempt to reconcile the parties’ conflicting viewpoints.
“Viewpoints should be reconciled. We will not be able to elect a president without a full package deal as had been rightly proposed by Speaker Nabih Berri,” the leader of the Progressive Socialist Party told reporters as he walked out of Parliament Wednesday night.Although military promotions are not on the dialogue agenda, the issue was discussed in closed-door meetings between rival leaders Tuesday, but no progress was made.
During Wednesday’s morning and evening sessions, the March 8 and March 14 politicians presented the criteria they want to see in the next president, reflecting their conflicting views on the matter.
While the Hezbollah-led March 8 bloc wants a president who has a wide popular base and who supports the anti-Israel resistance strategy, a reference to Aoun as indicated by Hezbollah MP Ali Fayyad after the morning session, the March 14 coalition is pushing for a consensual president and wants the presidential election to be held quickly.
No breakthrough was made in the presidential crisis as the two sides refused to budge on their conflicting stances. Most dialogue participants ruled out a Cabinet session at least Thursday, pending ironing out differences over the military promotions and the garbage crisis.
Prime Minister Tammam Salam had hoped to call for a Cabinet session this week to discuss just one urgent item: the trash crisis in view of the approaching winter and the threat of trash spreading in all areas as a result of heavy rain.
The Cabinet has not met since Sept. 9 due to differences among ministers over a decision-making formula and the promotion of senior Army officers.
Aoun, who did not attend the morning and evening sessions, was represented by MP Ibrahim Kanaan who said the FPM rejected that the issue of military promotions be discussed at the dialogue table.
He said all proposals presented to solve the promotions problem have been rejected, adding that there has been coordination between the Future bloc and the “Consultative Gathering,” in opposing the promotions.
The “Consultative Gathering” is a group headed by former President Michel Sleiman and includes eight ministers: three ministers loyal to him, in addition to three Kataeb ministers and two independent ministers, Telecommunications Minister Boutros Harb and Tourism Minister Michel Pharaon.
Kataeb leader MP Sami Gemayel said that the dialogue is a “last chance” to solve the country’s problems.
“We are duty-bound to exert all efforts to reopen institutions through the election of a new president. We will go in this attempt to the end and provide it with all potentials of success,” Gemayel told reporters as he left Parliament Wednesday.
He warned that failure to reactivate state institutions with the absence of a president and the obstruction of Parliament and the Cabinet’s role would plunge Lebanon into the “unknown.”