After Lebanon’s 11th unsuccessful session to elect a president last week, two independent lawmakers launched a sit-in to spur their colleagues to action.
BEIRUT — After Lebanon’s 11th unsuccessful session to elect a president last week, two independent lawmakers simply refused to go home, staging a sit-in at parliament to spur their colleagues to action as the country slips further into economic ruin.Parliamentarians Najat Saliba and Melhem Khalaf have been camped out in the parliamentary building in the capital Beirut since Jan. 19, sending an open call to other members of parliament to join them, meet quorum and finally elect a new president.
The country’s electricity shortage is one of many concurrent calamities that have engulfed Lebanon since 2019, when tens of thousands of people filled the streets to protest a spiraling financial crisis and the endemic corruption that has long divided the country into haves and have-nots — a divide that has only grown in the years since.
“We have no power to do anything but watch the people suffer and run after their daily, human, basic rights,” Saliba said. “With a vacuum like this, people are left alone to fend for themselves. This is the worst disastrous situation you can ask for.” The term of Lebanon’s previous president, Michel Aoun, finished at the end of October, and many worry that the post will remain vacant indefinitely.
“We cannot wait,” Saliba said, adding that constitutionally, parliamentarians can gather at any moment to vote, without waiting for a call by the speaker of the parliament. But the majority of MPs have steered clear of the hall.
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