Speaker of the House Nabih Berri has called for a plenary legislative session today, Thursday, at 11 AM to discuss the bills and proposals on the agenda.
However, the Strong Lebanon bloc announced last night, following an exceptional meeting led by MP Gebran Bassil to discuss the legislative session, that it "has decided not to participate in it because the proposed agenda does not qualify as a matter of extreme necessity based on the principle the bloc adopted for participating in legislative sessions in the absence of the president under the title of urgent legislation." The bloc emphasized the importance of the proposed laws and its significant contribution to their suggestion, discussion, and delivery to the general assembly, but stated that it does not see any urgent matter that necessitates their approval at this time, especially as there are still some contentious points surrounding some of them, and it cannot rely on a caretaker government that lacks legitimacy and constitutional backing to implement these laws.
The opposition MPs, in their statement, urged the opposition forces to continue boycotting any legislative session due to the unconstitutionality of such sessions before the election of a president. They considered everything issued by these sessions to be constitutionally invalid, and called on the resigned government to stop violating the constitution and adhere to the limits of caretaker duties, urging all MPs and blocs to boycott the upcoming legislative session to protect the constitution and partnership.
Political sources described the Strong Lebanon bloc's decision not to participate in today's House session as an obvious attempt by Bassil to exert pressure and improve the course of ongoing consultations with Hezbollah to agree to his conditions and demands regarding the presidential election, to end his outright rejection of the candidacy of the head of the Marada Movement, Sleiman Frangieh, for the presidency. These consultations have made some progress but have partially stalled concerning the agreement on the topic of expanded administrative and financial decentralization, which a deputy close to the Shiite duo described as impossible in the format proposed by Bassil, as it conflicts with the party's stance and cannot bypass the objections of other parties aligned with or opposing the party alike. It was noted that the format that could be reached between the parties should be based on the text in the constitution, and there are several projects in the parliament that can be discussed to extract a potentially approved format in the assembly, with the agreement of the majority of parties.
The sources pointed out that the absence of the Strong Lebanon bloc from today's session, aside from being a part of the competitive tactics among prominent Christian blocs to attract the Christian street, especially after the incident involving the overturning of a Hezbollah weapons truck in the town of Kahaleh last week, revealing the true stance of this street rejecting the party's weapons in contrast to the claims of leaders of the Free Patriotic Movement. This also indicates a clear sign of stalled consultations between the party and Bassil, and serves as a negative message from the bloc leader to Speaker Nabih Berri in particular, regarding his lack of enthusiasm and refusal to comply with Berri's request to facilitate the passage of the project for expanded administrative and financial decentralization in the format that some political parties view as divisive, which conflicts with the proposed bills and the constitutional text.
