Tuesday, July 12, 2005

The Lineup: Asking Lahoud To Say "YES!"

These are the names Lahoud will be pondering in his head all night before he gets back to Seniora tomorrow:

Maronites: Nayla Moawwad, Pierre Gemayel, Joe Sarkis, Ghattas Khoury, Simon Abi Ramia, Jihad Azour

Sunni: Fouad Seniora, Hassan Sabeh, Bahij Tabbara, Ahmad Fatfat, Mohammad Safadi, Khaled Kabbani

Shia: Fawzi Salloukh, Mohammad Fneich, Mohammad Khalifeh, Trad Hamade, Talal Sahili, Ghazi Youssef

Orthodox: Elias Murr, Tarek Mitri, Issam Abu Jamra, Atef Majdalani

Catholic: Michel Pharaoun, Nihmeh Tahme, Elias Skaff

Druze: Marwan Hamade, Ghazi Aridi, Faysal Sayegh

Armenian: Alain Tabourian, Jean Ogassapian

A couple of comments:

First, upon hearing Seniora talk about a 30-Minister lineup, Aoun opposed this move claiming that he asked for four representatives from his bloc based on a 24-Minister lineup.

Second, the Hizbullah/Amal bloc voiced its disagreement with appointing a sixth Shiite Minister who is outside of their bloc (Ghazi Youssef of Future Movement). Please, at least this person is an Economics professor at AUB (i.e.: he's educated and can help the government in something other than petty politics.)

Third, the Armenian bloc from the Future Movement were disturbed that the Tashnag Party were going to be represented, just like them. Their concern is: "We thought we were the winners here!" But they said that they will not create an obstacle to forming the government. I'm not sure if Alain Tabourian is a Tashnag ally, is he? If he's not, then where is the fourth representative from Aoun's bloc?

Fourth, notice how Seniora asked two Sunni candidates of a Justice background to become Ministers (Bahij Tabbara and Khaled Qabbani).

Last but not least (and I'm waiting for your input), Seniora has the government divided into 15 Parliamentarians and 15 technocrats/non-politicians.

Lahoud: Please wake up tomorrow and say "YES!!!" Aoun, Hizbullah: Please, let it be.

Update: Lahoud is most probably set to ask Seniora today to adjust further the Ministerial mix.

"Nobody knows how many rebellions, besides political rebellions, ferment in the masses of life which people earth."

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

why he should say yes !! ?
is it because you like hariri ??? let him say no , and let hariri form a government of the majority and let it be an opposition. instead of this inequality of the so-called "national unity governement".

Anonymous said...

hehe.you put a lot of weight on being an Economics professor at AUB..have you ever seen the department? Or talked to faculty. Donkeys are more educated...