Lebanon faces further polarisation after country votes in parliamentary elections
▶ As the nation lurches from one crisis to the next, its citizens have failed to turn out to elect its next leaders
Counting ran late into the night in Lebanon after parliamentary elections that will define the direction of the country were marred by a low turnout, scuffles and voting irregularities.
In the latest figures released by the Interior Ministry half an hour before polls closed at 7pm local time yesterday, only 37.52 per cent of registered voters had cast their ballots.
This was down from the 48.02 per cent turnout recorded in 2018.
“I voted for change,” Abdul Rahman Samad, 21, told The National.
“I was forced to leave Lebanon and I came back before the elections so I could get a chance to cast my vote here.”
Electoral watchdog Lade and the official Electoral Supervisory Commission reported hundreds of breaches of rules, including illegal campaigning on election day and the intimidation of election observers.
At several polling stations, voting was suspended after fights broke out. While voters nationwide said they were going to the polls to bring about change, electoral experts said they doubted the result will substantially change the political landscape.
The crop of independent movements borne out of the 2019 mass demonstrations that toppled the government of Saad Hariri, prime minister at the time, face an uphill battle against entrenched parties and a vote law that favours the status quo. Electoral expert Rabih Haddad, a professor of political science at Beirut’s University of St Joseph, said that the turnout suggested Lebanon was headed for a polarised parliament.
The highest turnout yesterday was found in Christian districts typically dominated by the Lebanese Forces party and in the strongholds of their Shiite rivals, the Amal Movement and Iran-backed Hezbollah.
“This is a war between the Lebanese Forces and Hezbollah,” Prof Haddad said. “In the end, we’re going to get a parliament that would be willing to go to war with each other for the sake of gaining power.”
Lebanon’s economic crisis has pushed more than half of its population into poverty, destroyed livelihoods and forced thousands of people to seek new lives abroad.
The country has also yet to pick up the pieces of the huge Beirut port explosion that destroyed entire neighbourhoods on August 4, 2020.
But yesterday, only 37.52 per cent of the electorate turned out to vote in a poll that will determine the path their country will take.
The 128 MPs elected from the vote will be expected to approve a financial bailout with the international community, pass needed economic and financial reforms and vote for the next president, a process that paralysed the country for 29 months until 2016 when President Michel Aoun finally made a breakthrough.
On the streets and at polling stations, people said they were voting for change.
“I’m in my fifties and this is my first time voting. I had to do something for change – maybe this will be the end of the mafias in power,” Suzy Majzoub said in Beirut.
Latifa, a homemaker, blamed the current politicians for the crisis that has pushed thousands of young people overseas to find work to support their families back home.
“I have voted several times but never saw results. We want change this time. Our kids are abroad. We want change, we want jobs, we want stability,” she said as she left a polling station with an ink-stained thumb.
“They took our kids away; they denied us their warmth and presence. I want them to come back to me, so I had to try.”
While the wait outside the room with the ballot boxes can be long, a young Lebanese woman said it was worth it.
Dana, 23, told The National she had voted for the first time and had done so out of a deep desire for change.
“I hope people who are voting this year don’t repeat the same mistakes of the past years and don’t vote for the people who are behind the crisis,” she said.
“We really want to see change. We’re still traumatised from the Beirut port blast. Why would we give them power again?” But what constitutes change is not universally defined. For some, it means the crop of independents born out the 2019 mass protests that toppled Saad Hariri’s government, but for others that means their chosen political party.
Nancy Wehbeh, 25, was a firsttime voter in south Lebanon. She too wanted change, but said the only people she trusts to fight corruption is Iranbacked Hezbollah and its ally, the Amal Movement.
Abu Ali, a coffee shop owner in the Beirut suburb of Basta, said the new MPs must put the country on the right track.
“We need to be an Arab nation, not mortgaged and pawned to outside nations,” he told The National.
He too said he was a long-time Amal Movement supporter.
But those who favour the independent upstarts accuse the traditional parties, which have served in successive powersharing governments since the civil war ended in 1990, of causing the financial meltdown that is plaguing the country.
Regardless, electoral experts do not expect there to be a major shift in the make-up of Lebanon’s parliament.
Sam Heller, an analyst with the Century Foundation think tank, also said the results would probably return the same parties.
“It seems almost impossible to imagine Lebanon voting for more of the same,” he told AFP. “And yet that appears to be the likeliest outcome.”
Electoral expert Prof Rabih Haddad said that turnout numbers seemed to suggest that the next parliament would be a polarised body with Hezbollah and its Lebanese Forces rivals being the largest blocs.
“This is a war between the Lebanese Forces and Hezbollah,” he said.
“In the end, we’re going to get a parliament that would be willing to go to war with each other for the sake of gaining power,” he said.
While Prof Haddad said the independent groups might break through in some areas, they will face an uphill battle even from inside parliament.
“Even if we manage to get five members of parliament from the [protest movement], what’s going to happen? Sure, they might be able to pass some laws but at this rate, we will need 50, 60 years to fix the country,” he said.
Asked why, given the stakes, the turnout was so low, he said simply that people are tired and do not trust the process.
“People are depressed. People don’t have the energy to vote any more. They don’t feel like they can change anything,” he said.
Lebanon has witnessed its currency lose more than 90 per cent of its value since 2019, staples like medicine and bread have become scarce, and more than half the country is now considered by the UN to be living in poverty.
It is plagued by frequent and often lengthy power cuts.
Meanwhile, Lebanon’s Parliament has failed to pass the reforms laid out before the 2018 election to tap into international assistance.
But apathy and despair were not the only factors hampering the turnout.
Former prime minister Saad Hariri, who leads the Future Movement, made the surprise announcement earlier in the year that he was stepping back from politics, refusing to put candidates forward for the election and boycotting the vote.
In Beirut, his supporters have heeded his call.
“We are abiding by the boycott,” said Mohamed Berjawi, a Hariri supporter.
“We are his family. Although I am older than him, I consider him like my father.”
Mr Berjawi said there was no other candidate he felt able to vote for.
“I belong to Future Movement and the Future Movement is not taking part in the vote, which means we are boycotting.”
In Tareeq Al Jadideh, Beirut’s Sunni stronghold, roads were closed and a large inflatable pool had been set up.
Adults and children splashed in the water as other residents sat and watched.
It seems impossible to imagine Lebanon voting for more of the same. And yet that appears to be the likeliest outcome
SAM HELLER
Century Foundation analyst