BEIRUT: Negotiations over a new electoral law are still on hold pending a softening of the rival factions’ tough stands on what voting system to adopt for the upcoming parliamentary elections, official sources said Sunday.

Meanwhile, Lebanon missed the first deadline for conducting parliamentary elections, the first in eight years, reflecting rivals’ inability to agree on a new electoral law to replace the controversial 1960 majoritarian formula used in the last polls in 2009.

Parliamentary elections were originally scheduled to take place between May 21 and next month to avoid a vacuum in the legislature before its term expires on June 20, but the continued deadlock over a new vote law has led to a delay of the polls.

Sources at Baabda Palace said political adversaries have nearly one month before the expiry of Parliament’s mandate to reach agreement on a new electoral law.

“Talks on an electoral law have come to a standstill pending a sudden breakthrough in the [monthslong] deadlock over the shape of a new voting system,” a source at Baabda Palace told The Daily Star.

“All the parties are in accord that proportionality should be the basis for any electoral law,” the source said. “But disagreements remain over the number of electoral constituencies and also whether a qualification or preferential law should be adopted.”

Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri appeared to be hopeful that an eleventh hour agreement on a new law was still possible.

“There are no locked doors in the face of efforts to seek a deal on an election law,” he told visitors. “God willing, we will arrive at something.”

Berri said all new ideas were based on proportionality “and work is ongoing on this basis.”

Minister of State for Women’s Affairs Jean Ogasapian, an MP who is affiliated with the Future Movement’s bloc, said that meetings to agree on a new electoral law would be stepped up after Prime Minister Saad Hariri, who is accompanied by Interior Minister Nouhad Machnouk and Foreign Minister Gebran Bassil, returns to Beirut from Saudi Arabia after attending an Arab Islamic American summit hosted by Saudi King Salman bin Abdul-Aziz in Riyadh in the presence of world leaders including U.S. President Donald Trump over the weekend.

The political limbo over a new vote law has enhanced the possibility that a return to the 1960 system to govern the upcoming elections was the only option left to avert a parliamentary vacuum. Machnouk and a number of MPs from various blocs said that elections could be held under the 1960 law, which is reviled across the political spectrum, if no agreement on a new vote system were reached before June 20.

Officials and MPs across the political spectrum underlined the need to continue talks to reach agreement on a new electoral law in order to avoid a parliamentary vacuum with all the grave consequences it entails on the country’s stability and ailing economy. Finance Minister Ali Hasan Khalil, a top political aide to Berri, said there is still time to endorse a vote law based on proportional representation.

“We are living a deep political crisis linked to an electoral law. We are today facing a reality that imposes on us a serious and quick quest to reach understanding on a new [electoral] law,” Khalil said at a ceremony in his southern hometown of Khiam.

Recalling that his behind-the-scene consultations with Bassil, the leader of the Free Patriotic Movement, and Nader Hariri, chief of Hariri’s staff, had focused on several vote law proposals, and that agreement had been reached on proportionality, Khalil said: “We call today on all political parties and official and partisan authorities to translate their previous and current commitment on the adoption of proportionality into a reality with the endorsement of a new electoral law.”

“We are confident that there is still a chance to reach a comprehensive national understanding to overcome the crisis,” Khalil said. “The hand for dialogue is still extended to all parties with which we disagree.”

Youth and Sports Minister Mohammad Fneish, one of two Hezbollah ministers in the Cabinet, said that rival factions have no choice but to agree on a new electoral law before June 20.

“We still have one month. There is room for optimism which I hope will be translated into the endorsement of an electoral law,” Fneish told a Hezbollah sports event in the southern town of Adloun. “Elections must be held and the need for an extension [of Parliament’s term] to implement a new law or to avert a vacuum appears to be essential.”

A member of the FPM’s parliamentary Change and Reform bloc said he was confident that a deal would be reached on a proportional vote law.

“Parliamentary elections will be held under a proportional law. We reject a [parliamentary] vacuum, an extension [of Parliament’s term] and the 1960 law,” MP Salim Salhab told the Voice of Lebanon radio station.

Meanwhile, the Cabinet is set to meet at 11 a.m. Wednesday at Baabda Palace under President Michel Aoun to discuss a host of financial and economic issues on the agenda.

One important issue is not listed on the agenda but it can be addressed if brought up by Aoun, Hariri or ministers: The renewal of Central Bank Gov. Riad Salameh’s term for another six years, a Baabda Palace source said.