During a press conference aimed at analyzing the results of Sunday’s municipal and mukhtar elections in Beirut and Bekaa, Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea said on Tuesday that March 14 Christians did better than in the 2009 parliamentary election ”
“The results of the surveys were not in favor of those who wanted these surveys,” Geagea stressed.
Geagea called on Free Patriotic Movement leader MP Michel Aoun to acknowledge the results of Beirut.
Geagea said that in Ashrafiyeh, Saifi, Rmeil and Mdawwar, the predominantly Christian areas of Beirut, “where Aoun called for boycotting municipal election and participating only in the Mukhtar one, the difference between the two (elections) was only 4%.”
“2,918 voters voted in favor of March 14 in Rmeil while Aoun and his allies got 2,987 votes which means 50.5% of votes,” Geagea added.
“There were 1,700 voters in Saifi. The result was 4-0 in favor of March 14. 60% of voters voted in favor of March 14 and 40% in favor of Aoun and his allies.”
“March 14 received 54% of Ashrafiyeh votes while the FPM and its allies got 46%. We won 21 mukhtar seats in Ashrafiyeh. As to Aoun, he got 7 out of the 28 mukhtar seats although 10 mukhtars in the region were already affiliated with him.”
Commenting on the reported Sunday attack in Ashrafiyeh against supporters of the Lebanese Forces, Geagea said: “An army unit was violent against some youth who had gathered in front of an LF office in Ashrafiyeh. We have filed a complaint and we asked the Army Commander General Jean Kahwaji to take the necessary measures against the attackers.”
Commenting on Zahle elections , Geagea stressed that 47% of Christians voted in favor of March 14, “which exceeds the voter turnout of the 2009 parliamentary election.”
He said that Zahle’s “survey” showed that “the real capacity of the Aounists is around 2,000 votes.”
Geagea clarified that “in Zahle, Aoun decided to nominate the solo candidate Tony Abi Younis, and according to the survey results, Abi Younis received 6,711 votes out of 23,000 votes.” According to the survey Aoun’s candidate ranked 43 out of 75
Geagea noted that the LF electoral machine confirmed that the voter base of MP Nicola Fattoush granted a major percentage of votes to former Minister Elias Skaff .
Answering a question on whether Skaff has regained the leadership of Zahle, Geagea played down such a hypothesis, clarifying that “Skaff’s list received 43% of Christian votes.”
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