MP wants his 400 nights in parliament to be alarm call for Lebanon
▶ Sleep-in campaigner Melhem Khalaf leads protest against failure to put new president into office
For more than 400 nights, Melhem Khalaf MP has slept in the same place. Not at his home, but in the Lebanese parliament, in a protest against failure by fellow MPs to fill a presidential vacancy that appeared on November 1, 2022.
The bitterly divided 128-seat legislature, comprised mainly of MPs from parties long accused of protecting their own interests, has failed 12 times to elect a successor to Michel Aoun.
The impasse is such that the assembly has not met to vote since last June, and there is no resolution in sight.
“It’s against our national dignity, it’s against our people who made trust in our decisions,” Mr Khalaf said from the parliament building in Beirut. “It’s our duty, it’s our responsibility.”
A lawyer and former head of the Beirut Bar Association, Mr Khalaf has argued that – according to Article 74 of the Lebanese constitution – parliament should be convened immediately to elect a president in the event of a vacancy.
And yet, more than 500 days on, while some parliamentary business has continued, the presidential palace in Baabda is unoccupied.
“We don’t have a state, it’s a
coup d’etat. We have made a suspension of the constitution. Nobody asked about the constitution,” he said.
“How can you manage the state when you have no legal reference?”
In the event of a presidential vacuum, the government is meant to take on the powers of the head of state.
But Prime Minister Najib Mikati’s government has only caretaker status and its powers are severely limited.
A war in the south of the country between Lebanon-based armed groups, mainly the Iranbacked Hezbollah, and Israel is complicating the situation.
Typically, presidential elections in Lebanon are drawnout affairs, ended only by a series of backstage deals between the main parties.
In Lebanon’s confessional system, the role of president is reserved for a Maronite Christian, the prime minister a Sunni Muslim and the parliamentary speaker a Shiite Muslim.
This impasse over the presidential election is not without precedent – it took 46 sessions for Mr Aoun to eventually take office in 2016 – but the situation
today is far more severe. While Lebanese and international efforts to end the standoff continue, Mr Khalaf points out that the constitution said parliament should be meeting in a singular, open-ended, immediate session until a president is elected.
Mr Khalaf is part of a new generation of MPs, some of whom have joined his sit-in, who were elected in 2022.
Some are affiliated with the 2019 protest movement against Lebanon’s ruling classes that led to the collapse of the government.
And while Mr Khalaf’s mission is for Lebanon, it is also one of personal conscience.
“It’s a cause, it’s something for me and why the people elected me,” he said. “It’s how
to serve my people. What is my duty? What I have to do, I have to do from my conscience.
“My principal activity is to save the country, to save my people, to save democracy in Lebanon.
“We are losing our democracy. For this reason I’m fighting – I’m here inside the parliament to say ‘No, we have to have this as a state of law, to respect the rule of law’.”
Mr Khalaf and his allies are challenging an entrenched system that has effectively held power for decades and been deemed responsible for a succession of crises to afflict Lebanon.
An economic crisis beginning in 2019, one of the worst in modern history, has been blamed on decades of corruption
and mismanagement by the ruling elite.
Those same people have also been held responsible for the Beirut port explosion in August 2020 that killed more than 200 people, injured thousands and destroyed a large part of the Lebanese capital.
Gross negligence after several thousand tonnes of highly volatile fertiliser was poorly stored in port depots was also to blame.
“What we are seeing is people who are in power and they manage their own interest,” Mr Khalaf said. “Nobody asked about the national interest. This is the real problem.
“All of these traditional politicians ... they make a silent agreement. They are here just to share power, not to build a
nation. When you are an MP, you are an MP of the nation.
“Article 27 of the constitution says the MP is a representative of all the nation. How many of them understand this article?”
But despite the dire situation in Lebanon and the presidential vacancy, Mr Khalaf said he still has hope.
“Of course, to make hope for our future generations. I am here because I have a hope, I have to create. We have the responsibility for the new generation to give them hope.
“I am fighting for democracy, for human rights, for freedom, justice. I am doing what the constitution imposed on me. All the MPs should be here. All of them should be here since November 1, 2022. They should be here to elect a president.”
All the MPs should be here. All of them should be here since November 1, 2022. They should be here to elect a president MELHEM KHALAF
Article 74 protester