The new Salam government, an extraordinary wager for the future
Beirut (AsiaNews) - By joining a government of national accord, after an almost yearlong stalemate with its rivals exacerbated by the conflict in Syria, Saad Hariri is making an extraordinary gamble on the future, and so are all moderate forces.
Maronite Patriarch Bechara al-Rahi was one of the first to congratulate President Sleiman and Prime Minister Tammam Salam. "Wisdom has finally prevailed," he said from Rome.
The new government led by Tammam Salam (pictured) brings together for the first time in three years Hizbollah, the Shia-dominated party, and Sunni-based Future Movement of Saad Hariri, which have been at loggerheads since 14 February 2005, when former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri was killed.
Speaking on the ninth anniversary of the assassination, Saad Hariri on Friday pointed to his father's example, and said that he hoped that moderation would prevail despite the dangers of a spill over from the Syrian war.
"The Future Movement will either be like Rafik Hariri, or will cease to be," he said at a rally marking the anniversary of the attack that killed his father. This way, he clearly distanced himself and his party from Salafist extremism, which posts its atrocities on Youtube.
Thanks to a compromise achieved after months of difficult negotiations, the new cabinet will include 24 ministers. Eight ministries, including Foreign Affairs, will go to Hizbollah and its allies; eight, including the Interior and Justice ministries, will go to Hariri's 14 March coalition; and eight will go to people close to centrist President Michel Sleiman, who is currently allied with Druze leader Walid Jumblatt.
The new cabinet has yet to decide on a shared programme, an especially hard task since the two sides are diametrically opposed on some sensitive issues, like Hizbollah's "resistance" and its involvement on the side of the Syrian army.
The new government has received congratulations from all sides. However, no fool, US Secretary of State John Kerry welcomed it, provided it comes up with a programme and makes it through the necessary parliamentary vote of confidence.
The government itself is the first major wager. The deal that led to the government entails a second stage. President Sleiman's mandate ends on 24 May. His replacement has to be selected between 24 March and 24 April. Under the constitution, Lebanon's head of state has to be chosen within this timeframe and shall hold office for six years.
If the same spirit prevails, this government, or the next one, will prepare fresh parliamentary elections, under a new electoral law that should be ready next fall.
Last year, failure to reach an agreement on this vital issue led the current parliament to extend its term of office by one year and four months.
Rebuilding state institutions is another important wager to the extent that their dysfunctions has reached such a level that people lost faith in them. The crisis of the Lebanese state is such that the country's economy is at risk and its pluralism, the cornerstone of Lebanese society, is being tested at a time of tensions, made worse by bombings and bloody clashes in Tripoli, and the influx of Syrian refugees, whose numbers are beyond Lebanon's absorptive capacity.
The new government is also a wager regarding the Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL), which started in January this year.
"By choosing the way of righteousness, we decided not to take revenge. We have made the force of moderation triumph," Hariri said.
Yet, notwithstanding the presumption of innocence, by accepting to govern with Hizbollah, the Future Movement has accepted that its ministers will sit with colleagues from a party that has five members who stand accused in Rafik Hariri's murder.
The five are free and openly protected by Hizbollah, which has imposed its law to the police and the justice system. Since it cannot get justice, the Future Movement hopes that at least the TSL will establish the truth.
Lebanon's pluralism is another wager, starting with the viability of the Christian-Muslim partnership in the country's political life.
"The Future Movement refuses [a] vacuum in the only Christian presidential position in the Arab world and the only Christian presidential position from Indian Coast to the shores of Morocco," Saad Hariri said.
A few days earlier, the Future Movement leader unconditionally backed the 'national memorandum' issued by the Maronite Patriarchate, which reiterated the principles of cultural pluralism and equality between Christians and Muslims in parliament and government, as well as the principles of Lebanon's neutrality with respect to regional and international alliances, i.e. its non-alignment.
Tammam Salam's wager is also regional, a factor that also made its existence possible. Three conflicts are the heart of the region's diplomatic bustle: Iran, Syria and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
The United States, Europe, Russia, Iran, Syria and Israel are the main players.
Although carried out separately, the diplomatic activities in each tend naturally to converge.
Still, no one can predict what will happen because they involve junior players, namely Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Qatar, but also Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon and the Palestinian Authority, not to mention Iraq and al-Qaeda.
But the very fact that these conflicts are being dealt with is a good sign, as some statements indicate, like a pledge for a rapprochement between Iran and Saudi Arabia or the visit of President Obama to Saudi Arabia in March.
The destruction of Syria's chemical weapons and controls on Iran's nuclear programme are also positive steps in this direction.
The wager of regional peace is basically that of more peaceful relations between Sunnis and Shias. And the first positive results should be visible in Lebanon after Saad Hariri held out his hand to Nabih Berry, the junior partner in the Shia-led alliance. A major actor on Lebanon's political scene, Berry has been the speaker of parliament for the past 20 years.
This analysis could go further. It could see the new government as a wager on openness, on the national conscience of the Lebanese people, on the convergence of interests of communities more aware of Lebanon's specificity.
It is clear that Tammam's government is not a government of national unity. Some parties have decided not to join, like the Lebanese Forces, which represents the Christian electorate.
However, that is not the prime minister's fault, since the former made a conscious decision not to join any government that included Hizbollah.
The Lebanese Forces are a one-man party. The party did not hold any debate on whether or not to join the new government. The Maronite patriarch tried to get its president, Samir Geagea, to change his stance, but failed
And finally, somehow, Saad Hariri is gambling moderate Islam and democracy can be reconciled, one in which an original form of political Islam accepts political collaboration with Christians, standing far from Salafism, whose retrograde character is beyond any doubt, but also from the Muslim Brotherhood's phoney democracy, which Egypt removed by a combination of factors that deserve to be analysed at another time.
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