Independents push for changes in system

BEIRUT, Lebanon —- Pierre Daher Haddad doesn’t stand a chance of winning a seat in Lebanon’s parliamentary elections today. A Christian running as an independent for a seat designated to a Muslim, his campaign technically may not even be legal. But that’s not the point.

He’s running on principle, he said, because Lebanon’s complicated system of assigning parliamentary seats based on the religious affiliation of a district is wrong.

“Many people that I’ve talked to love what I am doing,” Haddad told me. “But they would never vote for me. The change I am suggesting is too radical right now. I consider this a stepping stone for my country’s future.”

I met him near a polling station in Baabda, an Ottoman Empire era town in the mountains southeast of Beirut. Baabda district has six parliamentary seats representing its more than 145,000 voters; three seats are designated for Maronite Christians, two for Shia Muslims, and one for Druze.

Early voting for Lebanon’s more than 11,000 polling officials took place last Thursday, and Haddad was handing out ballots to voters as they approached the polling station.

Ballots are another complicated issue here. Lebanon doesn’t issue standard ballots, so each political movement prints their own, which list their candidates.

Representatives hand these to voters as they enter a polling site to vote. The ballots are tiny —- many just a couple of inches long —- with just enough room for their candidates’ names. Although blank paper is also provided as an alternative for voters to write their preferences, most choose not to do so.

These and other intricacies of the electoral process pose challenges to observer groups like the Carter Center, which deployed a 50-person delegation led by former President Jimmy Carter and Abdul Karim al-Eryani, the former prime minister of Yemen.

“Our assessment will address how the election is run based on Lebanon’s electoral laws and its international obligations,” said David Carroll, director of the Democracy Program at the Carter Center. “We will also speak to the potential negative effects such procedures have on issues like the right of voters to cast a secret ballot.”

Political passions and party loyalties run high here, and everyone has an opinion. I was surprised then to meet Lama Naja, 30, a Sunni Muslim who is fiercely politically independent. She also wants change in Lebanon’s voting process.

“People are ready,” she told me as we walked through the busy main street of Hamra in Beirut. “We are fed up. Many are afraid to act though because of the pressure of political parties on them to vote a certain way. “

Although she is glad for the international attention to the elections and believes their observations will help push for future reform, she says she think it is ultimately up to the Lebanese to change their country, not outsiders.

And change is happening. A new electoral law was passed in 2008 that includes potentially significant reforms. For example, voters’ thumbs will now be marked with indelible ink, and ballot boxes are transparent, both of which can help prevent fraud.

Change anywhere takes patience, perseverance, and determination, and from the people I’ve met so far in Lebanon, I think they are up to the task.

Deborah Hakes is part of a team from the Atlanta-based Carter Center in Lebanon to observe its election.