Future-Jamaa Breakup Jeopardizes Saniora´s Chances in Saida

 
Source: Al-Manar TV, 22-4-2009

At midnight Wednesday, the door for withdrawing candidacies closes in Lebanon, signaling the official launch of electoral campaigns for the June 7 parliamentary elections.

The great majority of candidates have stressed their will to move on with their campaigns in all districts. Challenge has been the bearing of both the opposition and the March 14 alliance, particularly after the latter dispensed with the Islamic Jamaa in Saida (south Lebanon), north Lebanon and apparently in Beirut.

Future Movement leader MP Saad Hariri has excluded the Islamic Jamaa candidate from his list in Western Bekaa, ended the electoral engagement with them in Saida. Prime Minister Fouad Saniora is running along Education Minister and MP Bahia Hariri in the southern city. They are both affiliated with the Future Movement. On the other hand, Islamic Jamaa candidate and secretary general Ali Sheikh Ammar and Popular Nasserite Organization head Ossama Saad are also independently running for Saida's 2 Sunni seats.

Talks between the Future Movement and the Islamic Jamaa have reached a dead end. According to a statement by the Jamaa, the Islamic group will seek "other electoral alternatives" that observe the interest of its popular base and political fixed standards. The group ruled out the possibility of withdrawing its candidates as it did in the 2005 election.

"Dialogue with the Future Movement has stalemated and the group's leadership will confirm the candidacy of its members in six districts, whether independently or with lists other than the Future Movement. This step requires an in-depth assessment," Ali Sheikh Ammar told Al-Manar.

The Islamic Jamaa explained in its statement that the group had given up one candidate after the other to the Future Movement.
They had abandoned four of their six candidates leaving Sheikh Ammar in Saida and Imad el-Hout in Beirut's third district. However, Hout's candidacy was met with a fresh movement by Future MP Ghinwa Jalloul; a shift that indicated that Hariri's party had also abandoned the Islamic Jamaa in Beirut.

The Islamic group's deputy secretary general Ibrahim Masri told Assafir daily that MP Saad "Hariri's insistence on denying the Jamaa what they deserve has brought things to this end."

The electoral disengagement between the Future Movement and the Islamic Jamaa will sharply shrink Saniora's chances of winning a seat in Saida. Given the southern city's political diversity and based on the number of each party's eligible voters, the Islamic Jamaa will likely be the scale that will decide the fate of Saniora's political future.

In the meantime, Saniora intensified his meetings with Saida residents at MP Bahiya Hariri's residence in Majdelyoun. The PM who had deserted the city to settle in Beirut since many years has promised to have his own residence in Saida.

Further weakening Saniora's chances of winning Saida's second Sunni seat are the city's residents, whether loyal to the Future Movement or not. The city's prosperity depends on south Lebanese cities, towns and villages which happen to be loyal to the opposition and have a bitter experience with Saniora during and after the 2006 "Israeli" war on Lebanon. High profile businessmen and tradesmen are worried that South Lebanon would boycott Saida's market should an imbalanced representation occurs in their city.

Minister Bahiya Hariri's representation in Saida has always been balanced with that of MP Ossama Saad, thus distancing the city from political and security instability on the one hand and preserving its good relation with other southern towns in all fields.

For his part, MP Saad's media office lashed out at Saniora's "participation rhetoric" in his campaign. The media office asked "when did Saniora let us participate or when did he deliberate with us on political, economic and social matters? Wasn't this the policy that has led to the fallback of our productive sectors and the increase in unemployment, immigration and poverty?"

From Saida to northern Lebanon, the Future Movement is also on the course of collision with the Arab clans of Wadi Khaled in Akkar.
Hariri had excluded the clans' candidate Mohammad Suleiman from his Akkar list sending Suleiman's loyalists to the streets where they fired gun shots in the air and burned tires. The protesters, who knew beforehand about the exclusion from leaked information, demanded that Hariri explains the reasons behind his move. However, Hariri who was later in Akkar to announce his Future list refrained from addressing Suleiman's issue.

Suleiman, who is still a candidate for the district's Sunni seat, has called for a meeting next Sunday in Wadi Khaled for deliberations with Arab clans in Lebanon and loyalists in Akkar.