Sectarian Democracy, Sectarian Despotism………
“Maronites divide their loyalty between an alliance led by Sunni Prime Minister Saad Hariri and a Shiite Hezbollah-led coalition. And while they disagree on many political issues, Maronite MPs are united in pushing for Lebanon to allow expatriates to cast ballots abroad if the voting age is lowered. Expats above the age of 21 who hold Lebanese citizenship are already listed in the interior ministry's registry. Just over a third of them are Christian. Analysts estimate that lowering the voting age would add more than 50,000 Christians to the electorate, mainly Maronites, and about 175,000 Muslims, roughly equally split between Shiites and Sunnis. While the change could tip the scale in a handful of swing districts, it would make little difference in the overall election outcome and the reality of Lebanese politics, according to analysts. Hezbollah is a potent force in Lebanon. The movement has been in parliament since 1992 and government since 2005. The Hezbollah opposition had actually secured the majority (52%) of the votes in Lebanon, but could not secure a majority of Parliamentary seats (it won 45%) because of the nature of the sectarian government system in the country…………”
That is the way it goes in the Middle East, the whole the region: it is either a dominant sectarian despotism or a rare case or two of sectarian democracy. The sectarian despots, from the Persian-American Gulf to the Nile, always claim that democracy will lead to sectarianism, but they are too stupid to see the irony.
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mhg
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