| Deputy Speaker of the Parliament of the Lebanese Republic | |
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| Website | Parliament of Republic of Lebanon |
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The Deputy Speaker of the Parliament of Lebanon is the second highest-ranking official of the Lebanese Parliament.
| Deputy Speaker of the Parliament of the Lebanese Republic | |
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| Website | Parliament of Republic of Lebanon |
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The Deputy Speaker of the Parliament of Lebanon is the second highest-ranking official of the Lebanese Parliament.
Though the constitution does not require it, an unwritten understanding between the Maronite, Sunni, Shia, Greek Orthodox and Druze leaderships in Lebanon in 1943, known as the National Pact, has resulted in the holder of the post being a Greek Orthodox Christian in every electoral cycle since that time. [1]
The prime minister of Lebanon, officially the President of the Council of Ministers, is the head of government and the head of the Council of Ministers of Lebanon. The Prime Minister is appointed by the president of Lebanon, with no confirmation needed from the Parliament of Lebanon By convention, the office holder is always a Sunni Muslim.
The National Pact is an unwritten agreement that laid the foundation of Lebanon as a multiconfessional state following negotiations between the Shia, Sunni, and Maronite leaderships. Erected in the summer of 1943, the National Pact was formed by then-president Bishara al-Khuri and the prime minister Riad Al Solh. Mainly centered around the interests of political elites, the Maronite elite served as a voice for the Christian population of Lebanon while the Sunni elite represented the voice of the Muslim population. The pact also established Lebanon's independence from France.
The Lebanese Parliament is the national parliament of the Republic of Lebanon. There are 128 members elected to a four-year term in multi-member constituencies, apportioned among Lebanon's diverse Christian and Muslim denominations but with half of the seats reserved for Christians and half reserved to Muslims per Constitutional Article 24. Lebanon has universal adult suffrage. Its major functions are to elect the President of the republic, to approve the government, and to approve laws and expenditure.
The Catholic Church in Lebanon is part of the worldwide Catholic Church under the spiritual leadership of the Pope in Rome.
Christianity in Lebanon has a long and continuous history. Biblical Scriptures purport that Peter and Paul evangelized the Phoenicians, whom they affiliated to the ancient patriarchate of Antioch. The spread of Christianity in Lebanon was very slow where paganism persisted especially in the mountaintop strongholds of Mount Lebanon. A 2015 study estimates some 2,500 Lebanese Christians have Muslim ancestry, whereas the majority of Lebanese Christians are direct descendants of the original early Christians.
Lebanon is an eastern Mediterranean country that has the most religiously diverse society within the Middle East, comprising 18 recognized religious sects. The primary religions are Islam and Christianity. The Druze are about 5% of the citizens. Outside of Lebanon, Lebanese people are mostly Christians. It is also estimated that a large proportion of its population are refugees which affects statistics. The refugees, mostly Syrian or Palestinian, are predominantly Sunni but also includes Christians and Shia.
The Constitution provides for freedom of religion and creeds and the exercise of all religious rites provided that the public order is not disturbed. The Constitution declares equality of rights and duties for all citizens without discrimination or preference but establishes a balance of power among the major religious groups. The Government generally respected these rights; however restricted the constitutional provision for apportioning political offices according to religious affiliation since the National Pact agreement. There were periodic reports of tension between religious groups, attributable to competition for political power, and citizens continued to struggle with the legacy of the civil war that was fought along sectarian lines. Despite sectarian tensions caused by the competition for political power, Lebanese continued to coexist.
Elie Ferzli is a Lebanese and Eastern Orthodox Christian politician. He served as Information Minister and Deputy Speaker of the Parliament of Lebanon in the early 2000s. He was succeeded by as deputy speaker Farid Makari in 2005. He expressed pro-Syrian sentiments during the Cedar Revolution. In 2018, he was reelected to parliament, and took again the seat of Deputy Speaker of the Parliament of Lebanon. In 2021, he skipped the line for vaccinations against COVID-19, taking the vaccine despite not being in neither the correct age group nor the correct risk group. In May 2022, he lost his parliamentary seat despite several attempts at manipulating the results.
General elections were held in Lebanon on 6 May 2018. Although originally scheduled for 2013, the election was postponed three times in 2013, 2014 and 2017 under various pretexts, including the security situation, the failure of the Parliament to elect a new President, and the technical requirements of holding an election. A new electoral law adopted in 2017 provides a proportional representation system for the first time.
Lebanese Greek Orthodox Christians refers to Lebanese people who are adherents of the Greek Orthodox Church of Antioch in Lebanon, which is an autocephalous Greek Orthodox Church within the wider communion of Eastern Orthodox Christianity, and is the second-largest Christian denomination in Lebanon after the Maronite Christians.
Lebanese Protestant Christians refers to Lebanese people who are adherents of Protestantism in Lebanon and who are a Christian minority in an overwhelmingly Muslim, 5.5% Druze and Christian country.
Lebanese Melkite Christians are the adherents of the Melkite Greek Catholic Church in Lebanon, which is the third largest Christian group in the country after the Maronite Church and the Greek Orthodox Church of Antioch.
Dom Ignatios Firzli, also known in Brazilian Portuguese as Ignatios Ferzli was a Melkite Greek Orthodox Christian priest and theologian who became Antiochian Metropolitan Bishop of Sao Paulo and head of the Greek Orthodox Church of Antioch for Brazil and South America.
Habib Abou Chahla or Abi Shahla was a Lebanese politician and public figure, several times member of Parliament. He hailed from an Orthodox family. Chahla had studied at the American University of Beirut and at the University of Paris. He was the minister of justice in 1943 and the speaker of the Lebanese Parliament between 1946 and 1947.
Bekaa II is an electoral district in Lebanon, as per the 2017 vote law. The district elects 6 members of the Lebanese National Assembly - 2 Sunni, 1 Druze, 1 Greek Orthodox, 1 Maronite, 1 Shia. It covers the West Bekaa and the Rashaya districts.
The 2022 Speaker of the Lebanese Parliament election was an election to elect the speaker of the 24th Lebanese Parliament. It was 7th legislative speaker election since the implementation of the Taif Agreement in 1989.