Lebanon’s Caretaker Foreign Minister Abdallah Bou Habib threw his hat into the ring of presidential hopefuls during his latest visit to Washington, telling several officials whom he met that there is a possibility to secure domestic consensus over his name should his candidacy receive U.S. support, Lebanese media reported on Thursday.
Bou Habib who was named by former president Michel Aoun as the Foreign Minister in the cabinet of PM Najib Mikati told US officials that “he was a former ambassador to the United States and enjoys Western and Arab relations that allow for boosting his presidential chances,” the media reported.
MP Gebran Bassil who replaced Aoun (his father in law ) as the Free Patriotic Movement chief has reportedly been actively trying to identify a consensual presidential candidates who will be accepted by the main political parties since he is opposed to to he election of Hezbollah’s undeclared candidate Suleiman Franjieh and the most mentioned undeclared candidate army chief Joseph Aoun .
Some in the Lebanese media are speculating that Bassil who’s been sanctioned by the US may be behind Bou Habib’s move.
He graduated from the American University of Beirut (AUB) and holds a Ph.D. in Economics from Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee.
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