Lebanonwire.com | Hariri sweeps first round of Lebanon election

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May 30, 2005

Hariri sweeps first round of Lebanon election
by Nayla Razzouk

BEIRUT, Lebanon - The son of murdered former premier Rafiq Hariri scored a clean sweep in the Beirut round of Lebanon's elections, the first in three decades held free of the grip of neighbouring Syria, officials said Monday.

Saad Hariri's lists won in all three constituencies in the capital, where a total of 19 parliamentary seats were up for grabs, Interior Minister Hassan Sabaa told a news conference.

But fewer than one-in-three voters cast ballots in Sunday's vote, leaving the anti-Syrian opposition without the massive popular endorsement it had hoped for given the sea-change in Lebanon's political scene since the last Syrian soldier left a month ago.

Officials put the turnout at just 27 percent.

UN chief Kofi Annan said he hoped the "democratic conduct" of the first round, held in the presence of over 100 UN and EU observers, would help the country recover full sovereignty.

"These elections constitute a major opportunity for the Lebanese people to shape their own future, to strengthen their political institutions and to restore their full sovereignty," Annan said in a statement.

And EU MP Jose Ignacio Salafranca Sanchez-Neyra, head of the European Union observer mission and member of the European parliament foreign affairs commission, hailed the "open and transparent" conduct of the polls.

Hariri's success was widely seen as a vote for his father whose February killing in a Beirut bomb blast triggered a major political upheaval in Lebanon that led Damascus to end its 29-year military presence.

His list won nine seats by default due to a lack of rival candidates.

Final results nationwide will not be known until after June 19, when the final round of the four-stage election is held.

Sabaa attributed the low Beirut turnout to the fact that Hariri's candidates were assured of victory, with the pro-Syrian camp on the retreat, adding that "some parties had also called for a boycott".

Saad Hariri himself won 39,499 votes, the largest number of votes in all constituencies.

"This is a victory for Rafiq Hariri ...the blood of Rafiq Hariri will not go in vain," the son told cheering crowds outside his Beirut home on Sunday.

Hariri, a 35-year-old businessman but a newcomer to the world of politics, has so far remained coy about whether he would consider taking on the post of prime minister that his billionaire tycoon father held five times.

"The results were a referendum for the continuation of Rafiq Hariri's national, political and economic policies," Al-Liwaa newspaper said.

Turnout was especially low in Beirut's Christian areas where some parties had called for a boycott due to electoral disputes.

"We are saddened by the low turnout, especially among the Christians," said influencial Maronite Cardinal Nasrallah Sfeir, one of the strongest opponents of Syria's long-time political domination.

President Emile Lahoud said Monday that after the end of the legislative elections on June 19, the new parliament "should give priority to the drafting of a new, just and equitable electoral law".

"The low turnout shows once again that the electoral law did not allow everbody to express their opinion and make their choice," he said.

Damascus was the key powerbroker both on the ground and in the corridors of power, a role which ensured the pro-Syrian camp triumphed in the three legislative elections held since the end of the 1975-1990 civil war.

Hariri, a Sunni Muslim, appealed for national reconciliation in a country still bearing the scars of the 15-year war that pitted Muslims against Christians.

"Today is a victory for national unity," he said, extending a hand to "all the factions who were our allies" in the campaign that led to the Syrian pullout.

"We are standing for change, we are standing for a new Lebanon, we are standing for no corruption, we're standing for a programme in the economy," he said referring to his country's crippling 34 billion dollar debt burden.

Leading figures in the anti-Syrian opposition, which is expected to take the lion's share of seats in the 128-member parliament, had called for a high turnout to give the new government the maximum of legitimacy.

Lebanon has some three million eligible voters, 59 percent Muslim and 41 percent Christian, who are voting for 128 parliamentary seats to be shared equally by the Christian and Muslim communities.