BEIRUT: Former Prime Minister Saad Hariri’s initiative for ending the presidential deadlock constituted a leap forward toward achieving agreement among rival Lebanese politicians on a consensus candidate, Future Movement MP Jean Ogassapian said Tuesday.
“The road map proposed by Hariri is not new and starts with the election of a president, then the formation of a reconciliation government, to be followed by a new electoral law and general elections,” Ogassapian said in an interview with Voice of Lebanon radio.
“The gist for the configuration of state institutions starts with the election of a president,” he said, stressing the need to agree on a presidential candidate capable of uniting all factions behind him.
“Otherwise we would be facing great dangers,” Ogassapian warned, referring to upheavals that swept Lebanon in 1988 and 1990, when Parliament failed to elect a successor to then-President Amin Gemayel, resulting in Lebanon having two prime ministers claiming legitimacy to rule the country in an interim phase.
Ogassapian said the March 14 coalition was willing to consider nominees other than its declared candidate, Lebanese Forces chief Samir Geagea.
“Our wish as the Future Movement is to have a new president from March 14 coalition, but this is not possible at present,” Ogassapian added.
After holding talks with Maronite Patriarch Beshara Rai in Rome Monday, Hariri declared that consensus on a new president was the only way to break the nearly 5-month-old political deadlock, and that the extension of Parliament’s mandate, which expires on Nov. 20, was essential to prevent the country from entering the unknown.
Media reports said Tuesday that Hariri and Rai had agreed on possible compromise nominees.
Free Patriotic Movement chief MP Michel Aoun, the undeclared candidate for March 8, has repeatedly rejected proposals to sideline him in favor of a compromise figure.
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