Tag Archives: Lebanon

The French Presidential Elections – Round One: How Lebanon Voted

As expected, both Nicolas Sarkozy and François Hollande advanced to the second round of the French presidential elections to be held on May 6th.

According to official results, Sarkozy got 26.1% of the votes while Hollande got 29%. The current polls show the Socialist Hollande leading Sakozy 54% to 46% for the second round. The shock of the night, however, was a huge score by the woman of the French “Front National” Marine Le Pen who managed to break the two-party dichotomy of France by getting 18% of the votes, according to the latest results.

Her score will come as a headache for the socialists who are deciding to round cloud nine up until May 6th. If Le Pen endorses Sarkozy, all bets are off.

But political analysis aside, here’s how the situation was in Lebanon yesterday. 15000 French people are registered to vote in Lebanon, out of which 51.5% voted. On top of the French residing in Lebanon, 1600 French residing in Syria are eligible to vote in Lebanon due to the situation in their country. Out of those, only 28% cast their ballots.

As a reminder, in 2007 Nicolas Sarkozy got 51.5% in the first round in Lebanon. This time, however, he got 54.47%, beating Hollande who only got 19.81%.

On the other hand, Marine Le Pen got 9% among French-Lebanese voters, almost double what her father managed in 2007 in Lebanon but still less than the result she got in France.

All foreign territoires put together have Sarkozy ahead of Hollande at 38% to 28.31%. Marine Le Pen came in fourth with 5.34%. The total participation in Lebanon is above the average for French expats, which settled at 40%.

Altogether, here’s yet another elections where Lebanese voters who hold a second nationality go with a right wing candidate.

Old Achrafieh (Geitawi) House To Be Demolished

A few seconds’ walk away from my house is a small building that I never took much notice of. That small building, however, is counting the days until it exists no more to give way for a new high rise.

As I walked next to it this past weekend and was taken aback by the metal frames to keep people out, I looked at the facade of the two-story building and couldn’t but notice how beautiful it could be. It’s a shame really that the mentality of renovating instead of demolishing isn’t taking hold in Beirut, especially Achrafieh.

Former minister of culture Salim Warde had a law proposition involving forcing contractors to have the new building they intend to erect be of the same number of stories as the one they demolished. His proposition went into a bureaucratic drawer and will probably never get out of it.

Achrafieh desperately needs such regulations. It’s fast becoming a concrete jungle of buildings that all look alike and feel imported, without a Lebanese flavor to them apart from the people that live in them. It’s a shame really.

And what’s even worse, the parking situation in my apartment’s street is about to get worse. People were allowed to park next to the building set to be demolished. The new building will obviously not allow that.

The French Presidential Elections – Round One

Over 45 million eligible French people are heading to cast their ballots in the first round of their presidential elections today, of which no one is expected to take the absolute majority of votes needed to win and not head to a second round between the top 2 vote getters.

Nicolas Sarkozy and François Hollande are neck and neck in the most recent published polls and both are expected to qualify to the second round.

In Lebanon, the registered French people residing in Lebanon are around 13,000. Of those, more than 7000 are expected to vote, in similar numbers to 2007 where 51.7% voted for Sarkozy in the first round and 71.5% in the second round.

Many more Lebanese-French who reside in France are also eligible to vote. The 2007 numbers from those Lebanese show a drastic preference to Sarkozy as well.

A fraction of Lebanese voters also support far right candidate Le Pen.

(source)

For the French residing in Lebanon, have you voted? Or are you waiting for the more decisive second round to cast your ballot?

Modern Day Lebanese “Activists”

Long gone are the days when being a Lebanese activist meant bracing yourself against the tyranny of the Syrian army in order to get them off your land. Long gone are the days when being a Lebanese activist meant physically protesting the Israeli occupation of your country. Long gone are the days when Lebanese activists were truly active.

Today, you are called an activist if you have the following: a blog and a twitter account. Why so? Because the majority of self-proclaimed activists use those two means the most in communicating their ideology. The ideology in question is a neo-leftist manifesto that hides under an umbrella of no politics.

And so the activism begins. Some child is killed in Gaza, let’s tweet about it. Some woman is raped in Lebanon, let’s post a Facebook status about it. Gas prices are going up, let’s blog about it.

Now you might ask me: but you’ve done those exact same things!

Yes, I concede. The slight distinction is I’m not a self-proclaimed activist. I don’t want to be an activist. I don’t have the word activist in my twitter bio, nor on my Facebook account. I don’t want activists to start “free Elie” campaigns if I end up going to jail for something illegal that I did. I don’t want my blog to be that of a Lebanese activist. I am simply a proud Lebanese who shares his interests and the woes of his society that he finds relevant.

Lebanese activists nowadays have redefined activism.

A Lebanese “artist” possibly defames our president and is brought into questioning? This is an obvious breach of freedom of speech. Why? because libel is under the jurisdiction of free speech these days.

Two Lebanese “activists” decide to write anti-Assad slogans on a wall and they get arrested? This is a travesty. How is vandalizing public property not a form of artistic free speech?

An “activist” is called out for a blinded mentality? They all rally behind their own. They can never be wrong. You are never right. You cannot criticize them being arrested for any reason whatsoever. You lack empathy. You lack compassion. How patriotic can you be when these people are giving their all to save you?

You really don’t understand, do you? These are neo-holy creatures. Their sacrifices are incomparable. You cannot fathom how much they take out of their time just to give you a better country and community.

An activist gets arrested? It cannot but be because security had an eye for him/her for a long time. Someone who has done SO much for your country cannot be in the wrong. Ever. This is a fact.

They call for a state of law. Once the law is applied, which happens once in a blue moon, they cry against it. Why? They argue that worse things are still happening elsewhere. Well, try to make sense of that argument.

What’s worse, if you don’t agree with most of what’s previously mentioned then you are simply unworthy, for lack of better words.

Activism in Lebanon is tweeting your fingers away, updating your Facebook status, while checking in at the protest or at the site of where you’ve decided to draw a graffiti on foursquare . It’s choosing passepartout causes and going with the flow. Today’s topic could be AIDS, tomorrow let’s make it gay rights. The day after that, why not dabble our fingers in some cinema? And down the list we go.

Their revolutions are ones that consists of drawing graffiti on a wall or writing a scathing blog post about an issue. Their logic is so impeccable that comparisons are drawn between, well, anything: graffiti and gas prices? Why not. Movie bans and electricity? Of course.

Today, even our activism has become sedentary.

But don’t tell them I told you that.

Ali Fakhri & Khodr Salameh: Two Lebanese Activists Arrested for Graffiti

Graffiti is not a crime? Really?

Two Lebanese online “activists” called Ali Fakhri and Khodr Salameh were arrested yesterday night while drawing graffiti at the Bechara el Khoury avenue.

The reaction to their arrest? Free Khodr and Free Ali online campaigns. Some are calling them the heroes of free speech. Others are calling their arrest a violation of freedoms.

Let’s get a few things straight.

It’s become very easy in Lebanon to confuse freedom with what is legal and illegal. In this case, drawing a graffiti is illegal. Other people do it? Other people don’t get caught as well. It doesn’t make it acceptable and it doesn’t make it allowed.

Ali Fakhri and Khodr Salami are honorable men, I’m sure. But we need to not get up in a fit every time someone is arrested and make online campaigns for their release and bash Lebanon left and right for persecuting people.

Just for comparison’s sake, the USA, a country we believe is the epitome of freedom in the world, considers graffiti as a punishable felony. I’m just saying.

If drawing on public property is your idea for activism, then be my guest. But you’ll have to suffer the consequences. Calling for a state of law cannot but begin with applying the law.

Graffiti is not a crime? We’d say anything to prove a point, don’t we?