BEIRUT: Hezbollah Sunday stood firm on its support for MP Michel Aoun for the presidency, a stance that is likely to put spikes in the wheel of a much-anticipated dialogue between the Shiite party and its Sunni rival, the Future Movement.
Hezbollah’s unyielding stance on the presidential vote also ran contrary to former Prime Minister Saad Hariri’s call for the election of a consensus candidate as the only solution to end the political deadlock that has left Lebanon without a president for more than six months.
Speaker Nabih Berri, meanwhile, said contacts would be stepped up this week to prepare the agenda for the Future-Hezbollah talks.
Berri, according to visitors, voiced optimism that the planned dialogue between Hezbollah and the Future Movement would be successful, and praised Hariri’s stances on the dialogue and on the entire situation in Lebanon.
“Hariri’s stances will help ensure the success of dialogue in the mission to be assigned to it,” Berri was quoted as saying by visitors.
Hariri said in a TV interview Thursday that he was ready for a serious dialogue with Hezbollah with the aim of defusing Sunni-Shiite tensions.
Political sources said the first round of talks between Hezbollah and the Future Movement would be sponsored by Berri and held in Ain al-Tineh in the first half of this month. Nader Hariri, chief of Hariri’s staff, and Future MP Jamal Jarrah, will represent the Future Movement, while Hussein Khalil, a political aide to Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hasan Nasrallah and a party lawmaker, probably MP Hassan Fadlallah, will stand for Hezbollah, the sources said.
Earlier Sunday, Fadlallah said Hezbollah supported the presidential candidate who enjoyed the widest popular base, in a clear reference to Aoun, the leader of the Free Patriotic Movement who heads the largest Christian bloc in Parliament.
“Our stance has become clear on the presidential election. It emanates from our vision of the national interest and not only from our loyalty [to Aoun],” Fadlallah said at a memorial ceremony in south Lebanon. “National interest dictates that the president be a person who enjoys real representation in his environment and at the national level and who can win consensus and accord among the Lebanese parties.”
He called on the rival March 8 and March 14 factions “to meet together on this national vision, based on Lebanon’s interest, which dictates that the president be a person who can steer Lebanon out of the crisis.”
“Hezbollah stands firm on its vision toward the presidency issue,” Fadlallah said.
His remarks came as preparations are underway to launch the dialogue between Hezbollah and the Future Movement. They also came three days after Hariri, the head of the Future Movement, said in a TV interview that he was ready to discuss the presidency issue in the dialogue with Hezbollah, while stressing that only the election of a consensus candidate could end the vacuum in the country’s top Christian post.
Responding to Hariri’s call for a consensus candidate, Aoun vowed not to withdraw from the presidency race, insisting in an interview with The Daily Star Friday that he was the most popular Christian candidate.
Meanwhile, Lebanon’s top Sunni and Shiite spiritual leaders voiced support for the dialogue.
“We appreciate the sincere and transparent initiative launched by [former] Prime Minister Saad Hariri, which does not seek political gain, but serves to rescue Lebanon and the Lebanese,” Grand Mufti Sheikh Abdel-Latif Derian said during a luncheon. “We hope everyone will join on the road to dialogue in order to rescue Lebanon.”
Sheikh Abdel Amir Qabalan, deputy head of the Higher Shiite Council, said dialogue is essential to elect a president.
“The Lebanese are bound to meet and consult on the ground that dialogue is a national duty to solve crises and a compulsory way to accomplish national events, at the top of which is the election of a president who can enjoy national unanimity,” he said.
