Berri vs Aoun
Hussain Abdul Hussain/Now Lebanon/September 29/16
Lebanon’s presidential vacancy has been the result of Hezbollah’s inability to reconcile its two allies: the savvy speaker and the naive general
Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, right, receives FPM leader Michel Aoun in Beirut, Wednesday, June 4, 2014. (Lebanese Parliament Website)
Presidential candidate Michel Aoun has built his political career on attacking Sunnis and accusing them of stealing Christian “rights” in post-Taif Lebanon. Yet Aoun’s demagoguery aside, experts agree that it was Lebanon’s Shia who emerged from the civil war as the biggest winners, snatching endless concessions from other sects and taking over key state positions, as well as inflating the Shia quota in the bureaucracy and the military.
Those were not Iran’s Shiites in Lebanon, but rather Syria’s. Through Moussa al-Sadr, the Assad regime had struck an alliance with the Shia under the command of warlord Nabih Berri. After Taif and the integration of militias into the state, Berri became speaker of parliament in 1992, a position he still holds until today.
Even though the speaker technically presides over the legislative power that checks the executive power, Berri plays two roles: On the one hand he owns Parliament, which he refuses to share with other sects. On the other hand, Berri demands the Shiite share in government, the military and the bureaucracy.
After every election, Berri shuts down opposition to the renewal of his position by arguing that only the Shia get to choose the speaker, a rule that the Shia and Berri have not abided by when it comes to the selection of the Maronite president and the Sunni prime minister. Hence, while the selection of a president and prime minister requires national consensus among all sects, Berri’s speakership is outside such consensus.
Together with Druze leader Walid Jumblatt, Berri is among Lebanon’s shrewdest politicians. The two men started their careers in 1977 and 78 respectively, and have been in an alliance ever since, with occasional breakdowns. Jumblatt finds solace in like-minded Berri. Both men depend on state resources to maintain their patronage networks. Both have an elevated sense of reality that has kept them from ever overplaying their hands. Because of their savviness, the parties of both Jumblatt and Berri are overrepresented in parliament.
The shakeup that forced Assad to withdraw his forces from Lebanon in 2005 and transformed Hezbollah into the country’s actual ruler amended the nation’s political game. Hezbollah, the revolutionary militia, became reliant on Berri the statesman to watch over Shia interests in the state, especially inside the military and its Army Intelligence branch. Hezbollah was also forced to shop for Christian allies and ended up with Aoun, who sees the presidency as his right with which he plans to restore Lebanon to its pre-Taif days.
Aoun’s ambition to take over the state naturally puts him on a collision course with Berri. But since both men are Hezbollah’s allies, the party has found itself juggling between the two, a policy that has resulted in Lebanon’s political paralysis and over two years of presidential vacancy.
Without Hezbollah protecting Aoun, Berri would have beaten the “General” so hard that Aoun would have not known what had hit him. Unlike the shrewd — usually low profile but extremely influential — Berri, Aoun’s ego often distorts his sense of reality. Aoun believes he is stronger than he actually is. Hence, while Berri and Jumblatt have survived the civil war, Syrian rule of Lebanon and now Hezbollah’s rule of Lebanon, Aoun was the civil war’s biggest loser, and even with Hezbollah’s support, remains outside the presidential palace.
So modest are Aoun’s political skills that he has advocated for Berri’s dream of amending Taif and renegotiating the current split between Christians and Muslims into one that spreads the state into three parts: One for the Christians, one for the Shia and one for the Sunnis. As my friend and colleague Michael Young once wrote: How does shrinking their quota in the state from half to one third, like Aoun has been advocating, serve Christian interests?
Should the Lebanese state be renegotiated into the Third Lebanese Republic, the Shia of the state — read Berri — will have the “obstructive third.” If Aoun thinks he can stop Berri from electing a Christian president who is not Aoun, watch Berri play Lebanese politics with a more powerful hand, and with the ability to constitute two-thirds simply by coming to terms with the Sunnis, whose leader Saad Hariri has been ready to elect any president that gives him back the premiership.
Lebanon’s paralysis and presidential vacancy have been the result of Hezbollah’s inability to reconcile its two valuable allies: the savvy Berri and the naive Aoun. Jumblatt supports Berri. Meanwhile, what was once called March 14 will play along whichever way the wind blows, if Hezbollah ever allows for a winner in the stand off between Berri and Aoun to emerge.
