June 17 (EUROPA PRESS) –
The patriarch of the Maronite Church of Lebanon, Béchara Rai, has condemned this Saturday without palliatives the failure of the last vote on Wednesday to elect head of state who, as dictated by the Constitution, must profess this religion, in a new unsuccessful effort to put an end to the power vacuum that the country has been going through for months.
“What happened on Wednesday was neither constitutional nor democratic. It did nothing but damage and shame our national dignity and sully us before international public opinion,” Rai declared this Saturday in relation to the failure of the vote between the two great candidates for office, the director for the Middle East of the IMF, Jihad Azour and the leader of Marada, Suleiman Franyié.
Azour obtained 59 of the 127 votes cast in the first round, while Franyié obtained 51 votes. For his part, former minister Ziad Barud has received six endorsements, while other deputies have chosen to post messages or support people who have not presented their candidacy.
To be elected, the president must obtain the support of two thirds of the parliamentarians –86 of the 128– in the first round or an absolute majority in the event that more votes have to be held, as contemplated in article 49 of the Lebanese constitution. However, and as happened on previous occasions, before the second round, only 81 deputies remained in the chamber, which caused a lack of quorum and the adjournment of the session.
Since the end of Michel Aoun’s term in October last year, the Lebanese Parliament has held twelve votes to choose his replacement, all of them unsuccessful.
In this context, the head of the Maronite Church and Catholic cardinal could not hide his frustration during the bishop’s synod held this Saturday in Bkerké, the seat of the Patriarchate of Antioch. “Everyone was waiting for a president to be nominated to get the country out of the crisis,” added the patriarch in statements collected by the official Lebanese news agency, NNA.
Calmer, Rai has insisted on the importance of successfully completing the vote. “We do not have a preference for anyone, we simply await the arrival of a president who is up to the three basic challenges: the construction of national unity, institutional restoration and the adoption of urgent measures” to save the country’s economy, in the midst of a crisis of historic proportions.
