After the successive withdrawals from the presidency of the government .. Which way out of the crisis in Lebanon?

Wassim Al-Zuhairi - Beirut

The Lebanese political crisis returned to square one, and the papers were mixed again after the businessman Samir al-Khatib announced his refusal to continue to run for the next government, and the subsequent announcement by the Lebanese presidency postponed parliamentary consultations to nominate a prime minister for a week after it was scheduled for last Monday.

Al-Khatib's withdrawal constituted a repetition of the scene of the withdrawal of the former minister, Muhammad Safadi, before which it was impossible to agree on the name of the former minister, Bahij Tabbarah. With the withdrawal of Al-Khatib, the shares of caretaker Prime Minister Saad Hariri rose again, and the search returned to the possibility of forming a government under his leadership.

However, the political stances on the shape of the next government remain unchanged until now, and the Parliamentary Bloc of the Future has expressed its hope to name the president in charge and immediately begin to form a government of specialists that has the required confidence locally and externally.

On the other hand, the President of the Republic, Hezbollah and the Amal movement support a mixed government between politicians and specialists. In between these two positions, the groups of the Popular Movement insist on a government of specialists entirely capable of saving the country and preparing for early parliamentary elections.

The leading candidate
While the contacts between the political forces continue to try to bridge the gap and bridge the points of view, no serious breach has yet been recorded, and political writer Youssef Diab has seen that there is no optimistic atmosphere near the maturity of the settlement that political forces seek to develop understandings about the shape of the new government and its president .

He said that Hariri remains the most prominent candidate for prime minister as he has the cover of the Sunni community, in addition to what he called the intersection of interests between most of the political forces to stay in this position.

Diab added to Al-Jazeera Net that there are two factors that pressure the political forces and the country as a whole. The first is the great economic and financial crisis, and the second is represented by the popular uprising.

He said that the political settlement that was concluded three years ago included the presence of Michel Aoun at the presidency of the Republic and Saad Hariri at the head of the government, considering that removing Hariri from the prime minister means the fall of the settlement and entering into a new equation.

For his part, the research coordinator at the Institute for Future Studies, Michel Abu Negm, considered that there was what he called a political lightness by Prime Minister Al-Hariri by offering some names and then dropping them.

Abu Najm said to Al Jazeera Net that these actions increase the complexity of the crisis, indicating that the President’s decision to postpone the consultations constitutes an attempt to find a common space of consensus between the forces represented in Parliament, and to avoid forming a majority government, as it raises sectarian strife as he put it.

He added that neither Hariri nor anyone else can impose its conditions on others, expressing his refusal to exclude any of the political forces or bring about a change in the equation under the pretext of a technocratic government.

Independent government
In the future, the popular movement maintains an independent government of specialists, and Mark Daou, an activist in the popular movement, saw that the attempt to impose the nomination of Samir Khatib to take over the government presidency by the Free Patriotic Movement and his allies fell.

He believed that there will be a whole week of trying to impose the return of Saad Hariri to the premiership, stressing that this attempt will also fail.

Daw added to Al-Jazeera Net that the only real solution is to form a government of figures that win the support of the street, considering that the decision is not only in the hands of the parliamentary blocs, but rather has become in partnership with the Lebanese street, which has been demonstrating since October 17.