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Parliament of Lebanon
Legistature of Lebanon From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Lebanese Parliament (Arabic: مجلس النواب, romanized: Majlis an-Nuwwab, lit. 'House of Representatives', French: Parlement Libanais)[12] is the national parliament of the Republic of Lebanon. There are 128 members elected to a four-year term in multi-member constituencies, apportioned among Lebanon's diverse Christian and Muslim denominations but with half of the seats reserved for Christians and half for Muslims per Constitutional Article 24.[13] Lebanon has universal adult suffrage. The parliament's major functions are to elect the President of the republic, to approve the government (although appointed by the President, the Prime Minister, along with the Cabinet, must retain the confidence of a majority in the Parliament), and to approve laws and expenditure.
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Lebanese Parliament مجلس النواب اللبناني Parlement Libanais | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Type | |
| Type | |
| Leadership | |
Secretaries | |
| Structure | |
| Seats | 128 |
 | |
Political groups | Caretaker Government (74)
National Moderation (13)
Opposition (54)
Other Opposition (19)
|
| Elections | |
| Party list proportional representation with seats allocated by religion | |
Last election | 15 May 2022 |
Next election | 2026 |
| Meeting place | |
 | |
| Lebanese Parliament, Beirut, Lebanon | |
| Website | |
| lp.gov.lb | |
| Footnotes | |
On 15 May 2013, the Parliament extended its mandate for 17 months, due to the deadlock over the electoral law. And, on 5 November 2014, the Parliament enacted another extension, thus keeping its mandate for an additional 31 months, until 20 June 2017,[14] and on 16 June 2017 the Parliament in turn extended its own mandate an additional 11 months to hold elections according to a much-anticipated reformed electoral law. After extending its term for 9 years, a new parliament was elected on 6 May 2018 in the 2018 general election. According to the Lebanese constitution[15] and the electoral law of 2017,[16] elections are held on a Sunday during the 60 days preceding the end of the sitting parliament's mandate, with the next one due on a Sunday falling between 22 March 2026 and 22 May 2026.
A unique feature of the Lebanese system is the principle of "confessional distribution": each religious community has an allotted number of deputies in the Parliament in a form of consociationalism.
In elections held between 1932 and 1972 (the last till after the Lebanese Civil War), seats were apportioned between Christians and Muslims in a 6:5 ratio, with various denominations of the two faiths allocated representation roughly proportional to their size. By the 1960s, Muslims had become openly dissatisfied with this system, aware that their own higher birthrate and the higher emigration rate among Christians had by this time almost certainly produced a Muslim majority, which the parliamentary distribution did not reflect. Christian politicians were unwilling to abolish or alter the system, however, and it was one of the factors in the 1975–1990 civil war. The Taif Agreement of 1989, which ended the civil war, reapportioned the Parliament to provide for equal representation of Christians and Muslims, with each electing 64 of the 128 deputies. Of which 43 are Catholic (33.5%), 27 Sunni (21%), 27 Shiite (21%), 20 Orthodox (15.6%), 8 Druze (6.2%), 2 Alawites (1.5%) and 1 Evangelical (0.8%).
Although distributed confessionally, all members, regardless of their religious faith, are elected by universal suffrage, forcing politicians to seek support from outside of their own religious communities, unless their co-religionists overwhelmingly dominate their particular constituency.
The changes stipulated by the Taif Agreement are set out in the table below:
| Confession | Before Taif | After Taif |
|---|---|---|
| Maronite Catholic | 30 | 34 |
| Eastern Orthodox | 11 | 14 |
| Melkite Catholic | 6 | 8 |
| Armenian Orthodox | 4 | 5 |
| Armenian Catholic | 1 | 1 |
| Protestant | 1 | 1 |
| Other Christian minorities | 1 | 1 |
| Total Christians | 54 | 64 |
| Sunni | 20 | 27 |
| Shi'ite | 19 | 27 |
| Alawite | 0 | 2 |
| Druze | 6 | 8 |
| Total Muslims + Druze | 45 | 64 |
| Total | 99 | 128 |
| Electoral district under 2017 Election Law | Seats |
|||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Beirut I (East Beirut) | 8 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 1 | |||||
| Beirut II (West Beirut) | 11 | 6 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | ||||||
| Bekaa I (Zahle) | 7 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 1 | |||||
| Bekaa II (West Bekaa-Rachaya) | 6 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | ||||||
| Bekaa III (Baalbek-Hermel) | 10 | 2 | 6 | 1 | 1 | |||||||
| Mount Lebanon I (Byblos-Kesrwan) | 8 | 1 | 7 | |||||||||
| Mount Lebanon II (Metn) | 8 | 4 | 2 | 1 | 1 | |||||||
| Mount Lebanon III (Baabda) | 6 | 2 | 1 | 3 | ||||||||
| Mount Lebanon IV (Aley-Chouf) | 13 | 2 | 4 | 5 | 1 | 1 | ||||||
| North I (Akkar) | 7 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 2 | |||||||
| North II (Tripoli-Minnieh-Dennieh) | 11 | 8 | 1 | 1 | 1 | |||||||
| North III (Bcharre-Zghorta-Batroun-Koura) | 10 | 7 | 3 | |||||||||
| South I (Saida-Jezzine) | 5 | 2 | 2 | 1 | ||||||||
| South II (Zahrany-Tyre) | 7 | 6 | 1 | |||||||||
| South III (Marjaayoun-Nabatieh-Hasbaya-Bint Jbeil) | 11 | 1 | 8 | 1 | 1 | |||||||
| Total | 128 | 27 | 27 | 8 | 2 | 34 | 14 | 8 | 5 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
| Source: 961News |
Numerous political parties exist in Lebanon. Many parties are little more than ad hoc electoral lists, formed by negotiation among influential local figures representing the various confessional communities; these lists usually function only for the purpose of the election, and do not form identifiable groupings in the parliament subsequently. Other parties are personality-based, often comprising followers of a present or past political leader or warlord. Few parties are based, in practice, on any particular ideology, although in theory most claim to be.
No single party has ever won more than 12.5 percent of the total number of seats in the Parliament, and until 2005 no coalition ever won more than a third of the total. The general election held in 2005, however, resulted in a clear majority (72 seats out of 128) being won by the alliance led by Saad Hariri (son of murdered former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri); half of these were held by Hariri's own Future Movement.
The Speaker of the Parliament, who by custom must be a Shi'a Muslim, is now elected to a four-year term, and is the highest office in the parliament.[17] Prior to the Taif Agreement, they are elected to a two-year term. They form part of a "troika", together with the President (required to be a Maronite Christian) and the Prime Minister (a Sunni Muslim). The privileges of the Speaker are unusually powerful, relative to other democratic systems. The current speaker is the leader of the Amal Party, Nabih Berri.[18]
The Deputy Speaker of the Parliament of Lebanon is the second highest-ranking official of the Lebanese Parliament. The office is always attributed to a Greek Orthodox practitioner.[19]
The Lebanese parliament has sixteen committees to facilitate the legislative process and provide oversight on specific areas of government policy.[20] The Finance and Budget Committee is considered the most important, as it reviews the government's budget and spending plans. Other influential committees include Administration and Justice, Health and Labor, and Economy and Industry.
List of committees:[21]
According to the Lebanese constitution[22] and the electoral law of 2017,[23] elections are held on a Sunday during the 60 days preceding the end of the sitting parliament's mandate. In June 2017 a new electoral law was passed. The previous system (under which the 128 members of parliament were elected from 26 multi-member constituencies under multiple non-transferable vote, and the candidates with the highest number of votes within each religious community were elected)[24] with a new electoral law instituting proportional representation in 15 multi-member constituencies while still maintaining the confessional distribution.[25] However, the 7 out of the 15 of the electoral districts are divided into 2 or more 'minor districts' (largely corresponding to the smaller electoral districts from the old electoral law).[26] Where applicable, preference vote is counted on the 'minor district' level.[27] With the 2017 electoral law, the country switched from a plurality voting system to a list-based proportional representation system.
The Parliament building was designed by Mardiros Altounian, who was also the architect of the Étoile clock tower. The building was completed in 1934 during the French Mandate period. Advised to build in the spirit of Lebanese tradition, the architect visited the Emirs' palaces in the Chouf Mountains. He also drew inspiration from the Oriental styles developed in Paris, Istanbul and Cairo at the turn of the 20th century.
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