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| Beirut cityscape © younesdory |
Every time I think I’ve made my peace with the dysfunctionaly of Lebanon, something new comes up that makes my blood boil. Most recently, it’s been the
parliament’s approval of the new electoral law whereby people can only vote for
candidates of their own sectarian faith in the general elections. As always,
this law was passed because of petty calculations amongst political groups to
help them garner more parliamentary seats, but what it actually does it take
confessional segregation to a new level. Now Maronite Christians can only vote
for Maronite Christian candidates, Sunnite Moslems for Sunnite Moslem
candidates, Shiites for Shiites, Orthodox for Orthodox, Druze for Druze and so on. I don't know which of the political parties pushed for this law, nor do I care, but this means that no one will ever
think beyond their little tribe and each of us will remain in our head a member
of our sectarian community, not a citizen of the Republic of Lebanon.
Saddest of all is that this seems to be acceptable to most
of the population. Essentially, the people of Lebanon have learnt nothing. Decades
of war and conflict haven’t done anything to teach us that this system DOES NOT
WORK, that, to build a proper state that has a chance of ever making
progress, where public services work, where there is
a viable economy we need to demand a nation where
everyone is equal under the same laws and where these laws are respected. Everyone
repeats this slogan but when push comes to shove, they fall back behind their archaic
boundaries.
We’ve proven time and again that no matter how many
opportunities History puts on our path, we simply don’t want to build a nation.
To those of us who truly want civil society and the rule of law, Lebanon
remains an attainable dream. We are a minority, the majority of people living
in Lebanon (I will not call them Lebanese because they don’t deserve to be
called that) are happy with the way things are.
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