MP Ali Hassan Khalil, Speaker Nabih Berri’s top political aid revealed that Hezbollah and the Amal Movement did not discuss with President Joseph Aoun, prior to his election, the issue of who will be the country’s new premier.
This revelation contradicts what Hezbollah’ parliamentary chief Mohammad Raad said following the designation of Nawaf Salam as Lebanon’s PM
“We discussed major issues related to managing the state and governance, and we voted for him although he was not our first choice,” Khalil told MTV.
“There was no agreement that was not honored. What happened is that the stance declared by the blocs we communicated with was leaning to voting for caretaker PM Najib Mikati and we agreed with a group of blocs on endorsing this choice, but what happened is that they changed their stance,” Khalil said.
He also revealed that the Shiite Duo’s ( Hezbollah and Amal) talks with Saudi Arabia “did not tackle the issue of the PM.”
“We are open to positive dialogue with PM-designate Nawaf Salam, all the skeptical remarks that were published by the media are baseless. We simply had a candidate who lost,” Khalil admitted.
“The Shiite sect is like other sects. It wants its rights .” He said
Parliamentary elections determine the size of representation in the country and we are a sect that has its presence and significance and democracy requires everyone to respect its representation,” Khalil added that the Shiite Duo is “in dialogue with Salam” over its representation in the government.