Bikfaya, Lebanon – Lebanon’s opposition captured one of two parliament seats up for election Sunday to replace assassinated ruling-party lawmakers in a tense showdown between the U.S.-backed government and opponents supported by Syria and Iran.
The government coalition retained the second seat virtually unopposed, according to official results. Although the vote was for just two of the 128 seats in parliament, it could affect the political future of this deeply divided nation by influencing lawmakers’ choice of president later this year.
Lebanon’s government and the opposition – led by the Islamic militant group Hezbollah – have been locked in a fierce power struggle. The choice of a new president could tip the balance in favor of one or the other.
Voting was largely peaceful, although a few skirmishes between the rival camps were reported.
Voters picked candidates to replace Pierre Gemayel, a Christian who was shot dead last November, and Walid Eido, a Sunni Muslim killed in a Beirut car bomb in June. Both were vocal opponents of neighboring Syria, which controlled Lebanon for 29 years until it was forced out in 2005. Gemayel was also a Cabinet minister.
The key vote was a bitter contest in the Metn region, a Christian stronghold northeast of Beirut. Amin Gemayel, a president from 1982 to 1988 running on behalf of the government for a seat his son held before his assassination last year, faced Kamil Khoury, a political newcomer supported by Christian opposition leader Michel Aoun. Aoun is a former army commander and interim prime minister allied with the opposition.
The government said its coalition lost the seat by a small margin. Interior Minister Hassan Sabei, announcing the results before dawn today, declared Khoury the winner by a 418-vote edge.
The pro-government coalition retained its seat in the capital Beirut. Mohammed al-Amin Itani, a candidate of parliament majority leader Saad Hariri’s Future Movement, won easily after the opposition did not officially sponsor a candidate.
