Report: Late-Night Meeting at Foreign Ministry Tackles Election Law

A meeting between several political parties was held late on Sunday at the Foreign Ministry in Beirut to tackle the thorny parliamentary electoral law in a bid to agree on a new format that meets approval of all political parties before the due date, LBCI said on Monday.

The meeting which was described as “positive” included Foreign Minister and Free Patriotic Movement leader Jebran Bassil, representatives from al-Mustaqbal Movement, Hizbullah and AMAL, LBCI said.

Lebanon is struggling to devise a new law for the parliamentary polls that are due in May.

The country has not organized parliamentary elections since 2009 and the parliament has since extended its own mandate twice.

Hizbullah has repeatedly called for an electoral law fully based on proportional representation but al-Mustaqbal Movement and Druze leader MP Walid Jumblat have both rejected the proposal.

Mustaqbal argues that Hizbullah's arms would prevent serious competition in the party's strongholds while Jumblat has warned that such an electoral system would “marginalize” the minority Druze community whose presence is concentrated in the Chouf and Aley areas.

The political parties are meanwhile discussing a so-called hybrid electoral law that mixes proportional representation with the winner-takes-all system.