Ex-FPM MPs to form 'consultative gathering', al-Rahi supportive

The four MPs who have recently become outside the Free Patriotic Movement intend to form “a consultative parliamentary gathering, that would become a pressure group, not a bloc nor a party, and its current main mission would be to produce a solution for the presidential crises,” the four MPs’ sources told al-Jadeed TV.

Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi, who met with the fours MPs on Thursday, “looks positively at what the centrist group of MPs can offer in light of political forces’ inability to present any breakthrough,” al-Jadeed added.

“Our aim is to communicate with Christians to devise a plan, but what’s more important is to communicate with the Muslim partners because without everyone’s participation no president can be elected,” Deputy Speaker Elias Bou Saab said in a TV interview. He is one of the four lawmakers alongside Alain Aoun, Simon Abi Ramia and Ibrahim Kanaan.

“The patriarch encouraged our ideas and support us to be in a position of dialogue with everyone and Bkikri has never been against dialogue or consultations prior to the election of a president,” Bou Saab added.

“Without this dialogue we cannot elect a president who would have the ability to govern,” Bou Saab went on to say.

As for the four MPs’ presidential candidate, the Deputy Speaker said: “We will not be alone. We will rather consult with a large number of MPs, a lot of whom are candidates whose names were mentioned in Bkirki’s presidential list.”

“Any candidate who meets Bkirki’s principles and represents a guarantee to the other camp, especially the Muslim partner, will have a chance to be elected,” Bou Saab added.

Separatey, Bou Saab said the four MPs “do not fear the upcoming parliamentary elections.”

“We will engage in the electoral battle according to a vision and a plan,” he added.