AFP, Beirut, June 8, 2009 – A pro-Western bloc inflicted a surprise defeat on Hezbollah and its allies at the ballot box in Lebanon, final results showed on Monday, as the winners faced a battle to keep the nation together.
The coalition headed by Saad Hariri, son of slain ex-premier Rafiq, landed 71 seats in the 128-member parliament against 57 for Hezbollah and its Shiite and Christian allies, Interior Minister Ziad Baroud said.
’This is a big day in the history of democratic Lebanon,’ a triumphant Hariri, now being tipped by some as a possible premier, told his supporters after Sunday’s vote.
The Lebanese Association for Democratic Elections (LADE), which had 2,200 observers on the ground, said it had registered minor violations, such as intimidation at polling stations and chaos in ballot-counting centres.
’Unsuccessful candidates could use these to appeal,’ LADE secretary-general Ziad Abdul Samad told AFP on Monday.
A 100-strong EU mission in its preliminary report said the vote was ’contested in a polarised but generally peaceful environment within an improved legal framework which nevertheless needs further reform.’
But analysts and newspapers questioned whether the rival factions would be able to form a unity government and ensure Lebanon is not plunged into a renewed cycle of instability and violence.
’Lebanon has entered a new phase today,’ said Paul Salem, head of the Beirut-based Middle East Carnegie Centre. ’The question is, once the government is formed what kind of challenge will it face?’
Despite its relatively low number of parliament members, Hezbollah — listed as a terrorist organisation by Washington — remains a potent political and military force.
After the vote, the militant party delivered a blunt warning that its mighty arsenal, which it says is vital for ’resistance’ to Israel, was not up for discussion.
The outcome was closely watched by Lebanon’s neighbours and the international community, with the country already scarred by decades of war, sectarian strife and damaging political crises.
Former colonial power France on Monday called on all factions to continue to work together as they have since the formation of a government of national unity in July 2008.
Israel, which fought a devastating war with Hezbollah guerrillas in 2006, said the new government must act to prevent attacks from its soil.
Parliament speaker Nabih Berri, whose Amal party is allied with Hezbollah, said he ’fully accepted’ the result of the vote, while Christian ally, the Free Patriotic Movement of wartime general Michel Aoun, also acknowledged defeat.
A Christian member of the Hezbollah alliance said it appeared voters had been spooked by fears that the Shiite Muslim group could impose an Islamist state.
Newspapers in former powerbroker Syria accused Hariri’s coalition of fraud and vote-buying but did not comment directly on the outcome.
Voters had turned out in force for one of Lebanon’s most crucial elections, a key test of whether it would continue on a pro-Western path or tilt towards Shiite Iran.
Preliminary estimates put turnout at more than 54 percent of the 3.2 million electorate, the highest since at least the end of the 1975-1990 civil war.
Under Lebanon’s complex power-sharing system, seats are divided equally between majority Muslims and minority Christians, who make up about a third of the four-million population.
Former US president Jimmy Carter, heading a team of international observers, said he hoped Lebanon’s political parties and their foreign backers would accept the results.
The current majority swept to power in 2005 on a wave of popular anger following the assassination of Rafiq Hariri. The murder was widely blamed on Syria, which denied any involvement.