BEIRUT: Parliament is expected Friday to ratify with an overwhelming majority the new draft electoral law passed by the Cabinet two days earlier, overriding sharp criticism and reservations by some blocs, and even a no-vote by the Kataeb bloc, parliamentary sources said Thursday. Parliament’s ratification of the landmark vote draft law based on proportional representation will clear the way for holding in May 2018 the first legislative elections in eight years.

Besides averting a major constitutional crisis, the vote law deal, whose key elements were agreed on by President Michel Aoun, Speaker Nabih Berri and Prime Minister Saad Hariri at Baabda Palace in June 1, replaces the disputed 1960 sectarian-based winner-take-all electoral system that divides Lebanon into small- and medium-sized constituencies used in the last elections in 2009.

Hariri praised the electoral law agreement and was confident of Parliament’s vote. “The elections are forthcoming, God willing. Tomorrow, we will go to Parliament along with [former] premiers Fouad Siniora and Tammam Salam and honorable lawmakers to vote for this law which we have achieved after hard work,” Hariri said in a speech during an iftar hosted by the Makassed Philanthrophic Islamic Association held at the BIEL complex.

He said Lebanon faced “big challenges,” most importantly improving the ailing economy and finding job opportunities for the youth.

A parliamentary source said the vote law was expected to be passed by Parliament with “an overwhelming majority despite criticisms and reservations made by some MPs.”

“After having been distributed to lawmakers 48 hours ahead of the Parliament session, the draft law will be discussed by a number of lawmakers, especially by those who have blasted the omission from the law of key issues such as a parliamentary quota for women, allotting parliamentary seats for the Lebanese diaspora [during the next elections], and lowering the voting age [from 21 to 18],” the source told The Daily Star.

Shortly after the Cabinet unanimously endorsed the electoral draft law Wednesday and referred the bill to Parliament, Berri called for the legislature to meet at 2 p.m. Friday to ratify the legislation as the only item on the agenda.

The source said that the ratification of the new law would automatically lead to a new extension of Parliament’s term to allow for the Interior Ministry to make logistical preparations and training of employees for the implementation of the law.

The draft law includes an article that calls for an 11-month “technical extension” of Parliament’s term, with the next parliamentary elections set to be held between March 20 and May 19, 2018. This will be the third extension after Parliament’s four-year mandate was extended for another full term in 2013 and 2014. MP Fadi Haber, one of five Kataeb lawmakers, dismissed the new vote law as “a mini-1960 law,” saying his bloc would not vote for the bill during the Parliament session. “We do not accept this draft law because it foils the effects of proportionality as well as national unity in favor of sectarianism, confessionalism and provincialism,” Haber told The Daily Star. He said the Kataeb Party’s Political Bureau would meet Friday morning to make a final decision ahead of the Parliament meeting. “We tend not to vote for the bill,” he said.

Criticizing the omission of a women’s quota, lowering the voting age and allotting seats for Lebanese diaspora from the law, Haber said: “The preferential vote based on the district rather than the governorate undercuts proportionality and makes the new law a mini-1960 law.”

Earlier in the day, Kataeb leader MP Sami Gemayel blasted the law, saying it distorted the concept of proportional representation. He criticized making the preferential vote based on the district rather than on the governorate.

Gemayel also questioned the formation of several constituencies, notably the Aley-Chouf district and the Marjayoun-Hasbani, seeing them as unnecessary and counterproductive. He said such a formation was aimed to please some politicians. He also condemned the lack of a women’s quota and criticized the planned new extension of Parliament’s term. “We have rejected the extension in the past and we will reject it today,” he said.

The vote law came mere days before Parliament’s term expires on June 20, thus sparing the country the dire consequences of a parliamentary vacuum.

In addition to dividing Lebanon into 15 electoral districts based on a proportional voting system, the agreement states that the preferential vote will be based on the district rather than the governorate as had been demanded by some parties, notably the Free Patriotic Movement.

However, the vote law did not include a women’s quota, sparking the ire of a number of a number of MPs and NGOs, notably the National Commission for Lebanese Women.

Randa Berri, wife of the Parliament speaker, criticized the omission of a women’s quota. “Any electoral law that does not take into account the woman’s right to be represented in Parliament is a law that lacks national legitimacy,” she said in a speech at an iftar hosted by the Lebanese Woman Affairs Association attended by Minister of State for Women’s Affairs Jean Ogasapian, Minister of State for Administrative Development Einaya Ezzeeddine and other dignitaries.

She called on women’s associations and civil society groups to take immediate action to demand the adoption of a quota for women in Parliament.

Other appeals, such as allowing military personnel to vote, lowering the voting age from 21 to 18, and allotting six parliamentary seats to Lebanese expatriates were also omitted.

Among the vote law’s 125 articles is one that introduces a so-called “magnetic voting card” that would reportedly allow voters living outside their constituencies to vote in the constituency they are registered in.

A group of national and leftist parties called for a sit-in on Riad Solh Square at 1 p.m. Friday near Parliament to protest the new vote law. “The proportionality adopted in the new law is a distorted proportionality that works to protect the sectarian system and consecrate the sectarian basis by limiting the preferential vote to a district level. The division of districts also increases national divisions,” the parties said in a statement.