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by Layal Abou Rahal
Lebanese lawmakers ended a two-year political vacuum Monday by electing as president ex-army chief Michel Aoun, who promised to protect the country from spillover from the war in neighbouring Syria.
The deeply divided parliament took four rounds of voting to elect 81-year-old Aoun, whose supporters flooded streets across the country waving his party’s orange flag.
“Lebanon is still treading through a minefield, but it has been spared the fires burning across the region,” Aoun said after taking the presidential oath.
“It remains a priority to prevent any sparks from reaching Lebanon,” the Maronite Christian leader said.
Syria’s five-year war has been a major fault line for Lebanon’s political class, and analysts have warned Aoun’s election will not be a “magic wand” to end divisions.
The next challenge will be forming a government and that is expected to take months of wrangling.
Presidential media office chief Rafic Chlala said consultations to name a prime minister would begin Wednesday morning, with an announcement expected at noon Thursday.
The parliament that elected Aoun has twice extended its own mandate, avoiding elections because of disagreements over a new electoral law.
Aoun had long eyed the presidency, and his candidacy was staunchly backed by Iran-backed Shiite movement Hezbollah, his ally since a surprise rapprochement in 2006. But the key to clinching the post was the shock support of two of his key rivals: Christian Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea and Sunni former premier Saad Hariri.
Hariri, expected to be appointed premier, said his endorsement was necessary to “protect Lebanon, protect the (political) system, protect the state and protect the Lebanese people”.
Hariri and Geagea both oppose Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, while Hezbollah supports Damascus and has dispatched fighters to bolster its forces.
That feud left MPs repeatedly unable to reach consensus on the presidency, a post reserved for a Maronite Christian.
After taking the oath, Aoun rode in a convoy of black cars to the presidential palace in Baabda, east of Beirut, where his wife and three daughters were waiting to congratulate him.
In Beirut’s majority-Christian neighbourhood of Ashrafiyeh, revellers launched fireworks and loosed volleys of celebratory gunfire.
The atmosphere in Jdeideh outside Beirut was one of untrammelled joy, with thousands honking car horns and popping bottles of champagne.
