President Aoun told Al-Akhbar that he will refuse to sign the decree that designates March 27th as the date of the parliamentary elections.
The Lebanese parliament had already voted for a law amendment that places the elections on that date. They also voted to allow the diaspora to vote for the 128 parliament members.
The elections were originally supposed to take place in May and the diaspora was allowed to vote for only 6 seats.
Aoun is against the early elections citing weather conditions and some voters will not reach the legal age to vote before March.
Gibran Bassil, leader of the Free-Patriotic Movement (FPM) and President Aoun’s son-in-law, also opposes these amendments. The Strong-Lebanon bloc, which FPM is part of, said they will file an appeal against these amendments.
The President said that he will refuse any elections date that isn’t May 8th or 15th claiming elections always took place in May or June – not before.
He said he will return the decree for the March 27th elections to be re-evaluated. Previously, he returned the draft for the early elections. The parliament voted for it nonetheless.
