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The euphoria that greeted the May election of new president Michel Sleiman and promises of a national unity government has been replaced by a growing sense of doom amid continued discord between the Western-backed majority and the Hezbollah-led opposition over who gets which post in the new cabinet. Even Prime Minister Fuad Siniora and parliament speaker and opposition stalwart Nabih Berri, both of whom had initially said that the formation of the cabinet was a matter of days, are now speaking of obstacles that remain. "I cannot deny that we are going through a difficult phase but we are deploying all efforts to form a cabinet," Siniora said Wednesday after meeting with Sleiman.
Berri for his part also admitted the make-up of the new 30-member cabinet was hampered by divisions between the parties.
Under the deal struck in the Qatari capital Doha on May 21, the opposition, which is backed by Syria and Iran, will get 11 seats in the new government, the majority will get 16 seats and the president will appoint three ministers. Negotiations between the various parties however have stumbled over who should head the key defence, interior, finance and foreign affairs ministries.
Opposition Christian leader Michel Aoun is insisting that Sleiman choose a candidate for only one, rather than two, of these so-called sovereign portfolios, a scenario rejected by the majority. He has also suggested that the prime minister's scope of authority be revised, prompting criticism even from within his own camp.
"The problem is that the Doha accord gave rise to too much optimism but failed to clearly address the divisions of power," said Fadia Kiwan, head of the political science department at Beirut's Saint Joseph University. "Each party is trying to protect its share of power but there are major political differences that are preventing the formation of a government with the minimum homogeneity needed for stability," she added. She said both sides were to blame for the confusion mounting by the day as related to the distribution of the various portfolios. "The majority is made up of various currents and as such needs a larger number of posts it can hand out to its allies ... so that it can influence public opinion and make gains in the upcoming 2009 legislative polls," Kiwan said. "But the clans cannot carve up the country like a cake," she added. "There are common interests for all the Lebanese that are being ignored in the current debate."
Nabil Bou Moncef, a political analyst with the pro-government daily An-Nahar said the bickering among the parties was not yet at a dangerous stage. "Lebanon's political make-up is similar to that in Somalia," he said. "The confessional and communal system we have renders our political system very fragile. "The struggle over the cabinet posts is taking on a very clannish overtone and as such the delays in forming the government are normal." In a sign of what could be awaiting the Lebanese, Bou Moncef pointed out that the country's constitution sets no deadline for forming a government. "This means that the current caretaker government can continue on indefinitely until the legislative elections," he said.
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