Lebanon's opposition lawmakers start work in chaotic first session
In their first session, Lebanon's newly elected opposition legislators found themselves immediately swamped in the quagmire of Lebanese politics.
Nabih Berri was reelected speaker of parliament for a seventh term during Lebanon's first parliamentary session since the May 15 elections.
Berri heads the Amal Movement and is a close ally of Hezbollah. The 84-year-old politician has held his position since 1992. This time he won by his slimmest margin ever with only 65 votes compared to 98 in 2018.
The remaining 63 votes were split between 23 blank ballots and 40 others with messages of protest about long-neglected issues such as sexual assault, the assassination of Shiite historian and activist Lokman Slim, the 2020 port explosion and protesters who suffered from police brutality in the 2019 revolution.
The parliament proceeded with two rounds of voting to elect as deputy parliament speaker Elias Bou Saab, Lebanon's former education and defense minister and a member of the Free Patriotic Movement. Bou Saab won over his Progressive Socialist Party-endorsed opponent Ghassan Skaff, with 65 votes to 60. There were two blank ballots and one that was canceled.
