Jumblat Declares Democratic Gathering End, Resurrects National Struggle Front
Progressive Socialist Party leader MP Walid Jumblat on Monday announced the end of his Democratic Gathering parliamentary bloc, after four MPs of the 11-member gathering decided not to back his candidate for the premiership.
Following binding consultations with President Michel Suleiman at the Baabda Palace on naming a new PM, Jumblat said that his bloc will now be renamed to the National Struggle Front.
“I would’ve hoped to continue the road with the comrades of yesterday in the Democratic Gathering, but circumstances dictate that there is no justification for its persistence, that’s why we will go back to the old, historic naming – the National Struggle Front – which dates back to the days of martyr Kamal Jumblat,” Jumblat said.
The new bloc, which voted for ex-PM Najib Miqati to head the country’s next government, comprises MPs Walid Jumblat, Ghazi Aridi, Wael Abu Faour, Akram Shehayyeb, Alaeddine Terro, Nehme Tohme and Elie Aoun.
The four MPs who are not part of Jumblat’s bloc anymore are Marwan Hamade, Henry Helou, Antoine Saad and Fouad al-Saad. They voted for caretaker Prime Minister Saad Hariri later in the day.
Jumblat’s stance comes after he declared Friday that he will side with “Syria and the Resistance.”
He said the aim of his decision was to preserve Lebanon's stability.
Hizbullah and its allies last week brought down the government of Saad Hariri because of a dispute over a U.N. probe into the 2005 assassination of Hariri's father, ex-premier Rafik Hariri.
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