BEIRUT: Attempts to form a new Cabinet have again been put on the back burner pending the outcome of petitions challenging the extension of Parliament’s mandate, a senior March 8 source said Monday.

 

“Serious talks on the Cabinet formation have not yet started because Prime Minister-designate Tammam Salam is waiting for the results of the challenges against the extension of Parliament’s term,” the source told The Daily Star.

 

Another delaying factor is that March 8 parties are currently busy trying to repair relations with Free Patriotic Movement leader Michel Aoun, strained by the extension of Parliament’s mandate, the source said.

 

Although Salam was appointed on April 6 to form a new Cabinet, a source close to the premier-designate said he was obliged to halt his consultations for more than a month, as he waited for Parliament to endorse a new electoral law to govern the June 16 elections.

 

Salam suspended his attempts to form a Cabinet last month, while March 8 and March 14 lawmakers held several rounds of unsuccessful talks to decide on the fate of the elections.

 

After failing to agree on a new electoral law, 97 members of Lebanon’s 128-member Parliament endorsed a draft law last Friday to extend the legislature’s four-year mandate, which expires June 20, for 17 months and delay the polls until November 2014. The MPs cited security concerns in the country for their decision.

 

President Michel Sleiman, who strongly opposed the extension of Parliament’s term, filed a challenge Saturday with the Constitutional Council against the extension.

 

Aoun’s parliamentary Change and Reform bloc, which also rejected the extension and boycott, filed a similar challenge with the Constitutional Council Monday.

 

“Salam is waiting for the outcome of the challenges against the extension of Parliament’s mandate before resuming in earnest his consultations on the Cabinet formation,” a source close to the premier-designate told The Daily Star.

 

Media reports said it would take at least 10 days for the 10-member Constitutional Council to decide on the two challenges.

 

As a compromise to both the supporters and opponents of the extension, the Constitutional Council may reduce the 17-month period to eight months, a political source said.

 

A delegation from Aoun’s bloc visited the Constitutional Council in the southern Beirut suburb of Hadath to file the challenge against the extension of Parliament’s mandate.

 

Speaking to reporters after submitting the challenge, Metn MP Ibrahim Kanaan said the issue of democracy in Lebanon was now in the hands of the Constitutional Council.

 

“We are allowing the country’s highest court, the Constitutional Council, which is Lebanon’s conscience and its Constitution, to assume its responsibility. We did our duty and rejected the extension,” Kanaan said. “We as lawmakers filed the challenge based on constitutional and national rather than political grounds.”

 

“It is an historic moment and this [important issue] is in the hands of the Constitutional Council. We hope that [council members] will succeed in their mission and achieve victory for justice and the Constitution,” he added.

 

He said that the decision to extend Parliament’s term was unjustified and accused politicians of fabricating a tense security situation in the country to delay the elections.

 

“There is no force majeure preventing us from holding the elections; we can’t describe as a force majeure a situation that is intentionally fabricated in the country,” Kanaan said.“If the council does not accept the challenge then we will be facing a dangerous, unprecedented decision. If it does accept the challenge then this will be for the best of all of Lebanon,” he added.

 

Meanwhile, the Kataeb Party and Hezbollah called for the formation of a new government of politicians to face major challenges in the country. The Kataeb Party also urged Speaker Nabih Berri to revive the meetings of a parliamentary subcommittee to resume discussions on a new electoral law.

 

A statement issued after a meeting of the party’s political bureau chaired by its leader, ex-President Amin Gemayel, underlined the need for Salam “to form a political salvation government as soon as possible that can cope with developments, shoulder responsibilities and take difficult decisions in this critically important stage.”

 

Gemayel met Sleiman at Baabda Palace, where the two men discussed the extension of Parliament’s mandate and the challenges against it.

 

Bint Jbeil MP Hasan Fadlallah, a Hezbollah official, also called for the formation of a political government in which all parties are represented.

 

“We want to facilitate the prime minister-designate’s mission and we want him to form a national unity government that reflects the true representation of parliamentary blocs,” Fadlallah said in the southern village of Kounin, at a memorial service for a Hezbollah fighter killed in battle in Syria.

 

He said following the extension of Parliament’s term, a political government was needed to run the country for at least one and a half years.

 

As a means of breaking the two-month-long Cabinet deadlock, former Prime Minister Fouad Siniora, head of the parliamentary Future bloc, said Sunday the March 14 coalition was proposing the formation of a nonpartisan government that would exclude all major political parties.