Najat Aoun Saliba, a member of parliament from the Chouf region, announced the end of her 243-day sit-in in Parliament on Monday. She begun the sit-in on January 19 with her colleague in Parliament, Melhem Khalaf, until the election of a new president of the Republic.
“I will continue to support my colleague, who will continue his sit-in until an open parliamentary session is held on the basis of successive rounds until a president is elected,” she said in a statement, stressing that she would coordinate with him to this end.
Saliba pointed out that when she and Khalaf began the sit-in, they had refused to be “involved in this serious constitutional violation,” but after 243 days, “we discovered that it was a vicious circle.” Justifying her assertion, she denounced the failure of the Speaker of Parliament, Nabih Berri, to “fulfill his duty and invite the deputies to successive sessions for the election of a president.” According to her, Berri and the parties supporting him “are incapable of guaranteeing the results of the ballot, which is why they are opposing it.”
According to Saliba, MPs are “largely responsible for the situation, since they do not assume their responsibilities and show a lack of will in this regard.” She pointed out that Lebanon “has become vulnerable to regional and international intervention,” and called on parliamentarians to “elect a Head of State as soon as possible.”
Asserting that it had become “necessary” for her to “defend the nation’s interests, including those that fall within my area of expertise, namely environmental issues, outside Parliament,” Saliba announced that she had “drawn up an environmental plan, in collaboration with environmental specialists, international organizations and local bodies,” which she plans to “implement throughout Lebanon.”
Lebanon has been without a president since former Head of State Michel Aoun left office on October 31. Faced with the failure of the deputies – deeply divided between the pro-Iranian camp (Hezbollah and its allies) and the opposition – to proceed with the vote, Saliba and Khalaf decided to remain in the hemicycle in protest.
