From: elie@spectrum.cmc.com (Elie Azar)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.lebanon
Subject: LA Times on "Elections"
Date: 25 Aug 92 22:53:53 GMT
Organization: Rockwell International - CMC



This article appeared in the "World Report" section of the LA Times.

It's copied, from the LA Times, without permission, and without any
changes, interpretations or editorials.

The only thing missing is a picture accompanying the article. I can't
reproduce the picture, but the caption said: "Supporters of pro-Syrian
Shiite candidate hang posters on bombed-out building".

Enjoy

Elie Azar

=======================================================================

	   Los Angeles Times - Tuesday August 25, 1992

		      World report section

			 National Agenda

		      Lebanese Cast Ballots
		      for Apathy, Cynicism


# Candidates gamely go through the motions in the
war-torn nation's first elections in 20 years.
_________________________________________________
By MARILYN RASCHKA
SPECIAL TO THE TIMES


	Beirut - Slip into a hospital gown and name your operation. The
offer`s free - but only for a limited time and only, according to
reports, if you vote for a particular doctor who is a candidate for the
Lebanese legislature in the current elections.
	Because of the long civil war that broke out here in 1975,
these are the country's first elections since 1972. The original
four-year mandate of the 1972 legislature has been extended four
times.
	As the minimum voting age here is 21, that means no Lebanese
under the age of 40 has ever voted - including many of the several
hundred candidates now standing for the 128-seat Parliament in the
three-week-long balloting, which began Sunday.
	Another surgeon - this one specializes in the treatment of male
impotence and has clinics in Beirut and Miami - promises that he will
pay from his own pocket to repair the electricity in his district. Less
affluent candidates offer to pay school fees or buy medicines.
	But where are the believers? Unofficial polls reveal that few
Lebanese are planning to vote. Apathy is widespread. Candidates are
seen as self-seeking and corrupt.
	"For years, I thought about what it would be like to vote,"
said Hiyam, a Lebanese woman in her mid-30s. "Now I have the chance and
I couldn't care."
	But don't tell the candidates. Cleanshaven and clad in suits
and ties for their election poster photographs, they project an image
of ultimate respectability. Candidates' names are often preceded by
their professions, such as lawyer or doctor. If he lacks such
high-flown credentials, the Parliament hopeful includes in his campaign
flyers the names of lawyers and doctors who support him. One man even
lists the names of his four sisters' husbands - all from prominent
Beirut families.
	Campaign coverage has been complete. Rows of posters, like
enlarged sheets of stamps, are stuck to every available wall and
building in the country. Blacked-out teeth on the faces they display
betray the work of graffiti vandals. One candidate, who bears an
uncanny resemblance to former Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev,
needs only a map of Lebanon on his balding forehead to complete the
likeness. But his posters are stuck just a bit too high, out of reach.
	These smiling paper politicians beam down on traffic jams,
suspended from street lights that haven't shone in years. Other faces
have been blackened by the smoke of burning garbage.


	So what makes Sami or Adnan or the other hopefuls run? The
prestige and perks of a parliamentary parking place rate high in
Lebanese opinion. They say no member of Parliament has ever left that
parking lot a poor man. They're slippery types, said one Lebanese.
	Intentionally or not, poster hangers often reveal a particular
cynical sense of humor.
	One, for example, fastened the image of his candidate to a
telephone switch box - that lack of working phones in the city ranks
with balky electrical and water service as a major aggravation for the
Lebanese.
	The poster of another candidate was plastered on an
English-language ad for paint and appears over the word "waterproof".
And the images of several candidates found their way onto billboard
advertising high-octane gasoline, promising products "Under Continuous
Quality Control."
	The quality and control of the parliamentarians-to-be are
exactly the problem. Syria prepared the lists of candidates who will
run and those who will win, charged a high government official. As for
the handful who aren't pro-Syrian - they were put on the candidate list
just to make the elections look fair, the man added.
	Lebanon's present road map to peace, the Taif accords signed in
1989, calls for parliamentary elections, but it also calls for the
withdrawal of thousands of Syrian troops form most of Lebanon.
	Although no date for the elections is stipulated in the
accords, the Damascus-backed government of President Elias Hrawi
scheduled them between Aug. 23 and Sept. 6, several weeks before Syrian
troops are scheduled to leave.
	Promises and free surgery aside, the Lebanese are demonstrating
their belief that the pen speaks louder than the sword - or scalpel.
	"Yes, I'm going to vote," said a Lebanese in the country's
north. "But I'm not going to write the names of the candidates.  No,
I'm going to put down `water, electricity, and garbage collection`
instead."
	An anonymous voter expressed an early opinion of a
parliamentary hopeful - rumored to be deep into both drugs and arms
sales - by pasting a notice warning Lebanon's youth against drugs over
the top of the candidate's poster.
	Lebanon's Maronite Christians, who lead the opposition to the
Syrian presence, are boycotting the parliamentary elections 'en masse'.
Most of their candidates have withdrawn, and last week several leading
Sunni Muslims followed suit, throwing further doubt on the validity of
the vote.


	The first choice of many Lebanese across the sectarian board is
Gen. Michel Aoun, the exiled ex-head of the Lebanese army who was
toppled by Syria in 1990. In the darkness of underpasses and  tunnels
across the country, drivers sound out what is called here the "Aoun
beep", a rhythmic honking that signifies support for the general. Aoun
has been barred from politics until 1996, but he could be write-in
candidate.
	there are half a dozen members of the shiite Hezbollah
organization in the running for parliamentary seats, although they tend
to keep a low personal profile. Last February, Israeli soldiers
ambushed and killed a Hezbollah sheik in southern Lebanon, and Israel
still holds Sheik Abdul Karim Obeid, a Hezbollah cleric abducted in
July 1989.
	While the Shiite fundamentalist - who appear to have lost some
of the support they formerly enjoyed from Iran - are given remote
chances in the balloting, the popularity f Sunni Muslim fundamentalists
here is growing among poor Lebanese followers of that branch of Islam.
	More wordly Sunnis and many Christians fear this movement could
gather enough momentum to elect at least one of their candidates -
which would be a first in Lebanese political history.
Newsgroups: soc.culture.lebanon