Lebanese parliament to elect new speaker on Wednesday

By Edward Haddad

BEIRUT (AA) - Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri on Tuesday called for an extraordinary session of the country’s newly-elected parliament to choose a new assembly speaker.

Slated for Wednesday, the session will be chaired by the new assembly’s eldest MP, 86-year-old Michel al-Murr.

According to the Taif Accord (which ended Lebanon’s civil war in 1990 and laid out its current “sectarian” system of governance), the post of parliament speaker is reserved for Lebanon’s Shia community.

The Lebanese constitution, adopted in the wake of the Taif Accord, says the president must consult with the country’s main parliamentary blocs before nominating a new prime minister.

The Taif Accord grants the premiership to Lebanon’s Sunni community, the presidency to Maronite Christians, and the assembly speakership to the country’s Shias.

Berri, the current assembly speaker (who also heads the Shia Amal Movement and is an ally of Hezbollah) has held the position since 1992.

Hezbollah, Amal, the Future Movement (led by PM Saad Hariri), the Progressive Socialist Party and the March 8 movement have all declared their support for Berri.

The Lebanese Forces, a Maronite Christian party, for its part, has called for the speakership to be put to a parliamentary vote.

As for the post of deputy parliament speaker, the Christian Free Patriotic Movement, which supports President Michel Aoun, has nominated Orthodox lawmaker Elie Najib Ferzli for the position.

Ferzli, who held the post before the Syrian military withdrew from Lebanon in 2005, is known to be close to Damascus and to Lebanon’s March 8 alliance.