Prospects of FPM Win in Metn Elections Rising

"The Metn battle is political and we will not accept emptying it of its political content," Lahoud said. "The development of his (Murr) position led to rapprochement. However, this does not mean that we authorized MP Murr to form alliances in Metn. His vision of the electoral battle in the precinct is different from ours," he added. "We do not favor importing candidates from outside the Metn to conduct this battle...I only participate in an electoral list which I have a role in forming. I will not join any list that I did not contribute in forming," the minister stressed.

There are eight seats in the Metn precinct: four seats for Maronite, two seats for Orthodox, one seat for Catholics and one seat for Armenian Orthodox.

Metn, historically, represents the "weight" of Christians in Lebanon.

It will have to decide between a divided March 14 representation or the opposition. The Free Patriotic Movement will run the elections in Metn with a complete list of opposition candidates, making it harder for its opponents in March 14 and others, namely "centrist independents", to break or penetrate it. The great majority of the precinct has pledged allegiance to MP Michel Aoun and his FPM.

Murr's efforts have not yet bore fruit yet, as he seeks to form a list of independents to form an alliance with the Phalange Party of former President Amin Gemayel exclusively. Murr want to keep the Armenian seat vacant to secure the votes of the Tashnag party. The Armenian party however, promised Murr to vote solely for him, but not for the entire list as Tashnag is allied to Aoun's FPM.

The dilemma that is facing MP Murr is that the Phalange Party insists that the list of candidate be complete, including an Armenian.
According to sources, the MP will go to plan B to face Gemayel's insistence and announce two lists each comprising four candidates.

However, well informed sources told Al-Manar that the Tashnag Party has rejected Murr's plan B and described it as an indirect alliance with the camp that insists on having an Armenian candidate to contend the Tashnag candidate. So far, Murr's status in the upcoming elections is not stable and the same goes for his allies.

They will need a miracle to succeed in competing Aoun's list, especially that there are too many candidates for a limited number of seats in Metn.
For instance the four Maronite seats are contended by Sami Gemayel (Amine Gemayel's son), Nasib Lahoud (Murr's traditional opponent), Sarkis Sarkis, Pierre Ashkar, Edie Abil Lamaa and Wadie Hajj.