Berri: No to Extension, No to 1960 Law, No to Vacuum

Speaker Nabih Berri on Wednesday stressed his rejection of three possibilities: extending the parliament's term, holding polls under the 1960 law, or plunging the country into parliamentary vacuum.

“No to extension, no the 1960 law and no to vacuum,” MPs quoted Berri as saying during his weekly meeting with lawmakers in Ain el-Tineh.

“It is required to exert efforts to pass a new law as soon as possible or else we would enter a dangerous phase with the beginning of April,” Berri warned.

He reiterated that “the government should discuss and approve this law and refer it to parliament,” noting that the electoral law is the government's “top mission.”

The speaker also noted that “the national interest requires reaching an electoral law containing proportional representation.”

“Under such a law, we would be getting rid of sectarianism while preserving the sects,” Berri pointed out.

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

While al-Mustaqbal Movement has rejected that the electoral law be fully based on proportional representation, arguing that Hizbullah's arms would prevent serious competition in the party's strongholds, Druze leader MP Walid Jumblat has totally rejected proportional representation, even within a hybrid law, warning that it would “marginalize” the minority Druze community.

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