Opposition MPs have announced that they are “receptive to all initiatives” aimed at breaking the deadlock in the presidential elections. In a statement issued on Monday evening, opposition MPs said they were “ready to consult with the Progressive Socialist Party bloc, but also with the Free Patriotic Movement, which (FPM) had opted for a centrist candidate” in allusion to former minister Jihad Azour, for whom the opposition and the FPM had voted at the June 14, 2023 session.
The statement was issued after a meeting in Saifi between opposition MPs and delegations from the PSP and FPM. The latter are currently mobilizing with various blocs in an attempt to unblock the presidential elections.
“These consultations, as perceived by opposition MPs, are in themselves a model for the required consultation, which aims to reconcile differing viewpoints among the parties involved,” reads the press release. However, the opposition deputies expressed their “refusal to allow these consultations to turn into ploys aimed at violating the Constitution and circumventing the initiatives of the Group of Five (United States, France, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Egypt).” It added: “These maneuvers, repeated in previous elections (by the pro-Hezbollah moumaanaa axis), led to the collapse we are witnessing today.”
The sovereignist MPs thus reiterated their “openness to consultations limited in time, as they are currently taking place, free from any consecration of new norms that violate constitutional principles, and without any preconditions, in particular concerning the imposition of a candidate, so as to persuade the opposing camp to convene an open session in Parliament to elect the President of the Republic.”
