Clashes mar Saudi’s landslide win in Sidon

Daily Star

Monday, May 24, 2010

SIDON/JEZZINE: Strident rhetoric spilled over into physical violence in Sidon on Sunday as clashes erupted across the city’s voting stations.

Exit polls suggested a landslide win for Mohammad al-Saudi’s Consensus and Development list, with initial counts giving the Future Movement-backed ticket five times as many votes as the rival Popular Will.

Two people, thought to be supporters of former Sidon MP and Popular Will list backer Osama Saad, were seriously injured in a knife fight, while more than 30 of Saad’s partisans were fought off by security forces after attempting to storm a voting center.

The National News Agency (NNA) reported that the men had been injured during a dispute at a polling station near the Lebanese-Kuwaiti School in Sidon’s Al-Bustan al-Kabir neighborhood before being rushed to a nearby hospital. In a separate incident, a male voter was badly beaten in downtown Sidon after a dispute with rival supporters.

Earlier Sunday, 30 Saad supporters, some of whom carrying weapons, were detained after attempting to force entry to the Maksar al-Abed polling station.

Sidon’s electoral battle had been talked up by rival groups for weeks. Consensus and Development list member Ahmad Hariri, son of Sidon MP Bahia Hariri, had accused rival list backer Saad of spreading “lies to mislead the public.”

With the threat of violence hanging over them, voters took the streets in vast numbers as the town crawled with Lebanese Army patrols. As The Daily Star went to print, 30,350 voters had inked their thumbs in the town, putting turnout at just over 55 percent.

Many residents could be seen queuing before polling stations opened at 7am. Some showed up with babies on shoulders or migrant domestic workers in tow, while others turned out after being delivered to vote in ambulances.

With the streets bristling with LAF patrols, Lebanese Army Intelligence Services Deputy Chief Abbas Brahim arrived to follow-up on security developments upon the request of President Michel Sleiman.

Rival list delegates continued the mudslinging of previous weeks, with Saad accusing authorities of ignoring alleged cases of bribery by Future Movement delegates.

“Recurring violations over the past few days led to tensions in the city,” he said after casting his ballot. Saad added that his list held the Future Movement responsible for any breach of electoral law.

He attributed the incident at Maksar al-Abed to a breach of electoral law by a Consensus and Development voter.

“A woman entered the polling station and then attempted to vote [again], which raised objections by our electoral workers,” he said. “Consequently, security forces shut down the polling station and banned us from getting inside.”

Saad’s entourage was involved in several additional scuffles, including a fist fight with security forces in the Dekerman neighborhood.

Al-Jamaa al-Islamiya official in south Lebanon, Bassam Hammoud, slammed attempts by Saad supporters to intimidate voters and “pushing Sidon voters to remain home.”

On Saturday, the Lebanese Army found and defused a bomb laid at Consensus and Development list head Mohammad al-Saudi’s address. A stun grenade dropped by two unidentified assailants exploded in the northern part of Sidon Sunday with security forces pursuing and apprehending the pair.

Sidon MP Bahia Hariri called upon security forces to maintain order during the fiercely contested vote. In spite of flare-ups, she labeled Sunday “a healthy challenge and competition between two lists which people will choose from.”

She said her party would have “no problem with the results and we will comply with them.”

For his part, incumbent mayor Abdel Rahman al-Bizri reiterated his office’s impartiality.

“We stress that that the elections should remain away from politics,” he said in a statement.

A Lebanese Army soldier at a central Sidon polling station told The Daily Star that “in spite of today being very busy and having lots of important people voting, there have been no problems here.”

He added, however, that “problems have occurred all across the city.”

Most voters expressed concern over the security situation.

“I hope that this day passes without incident,” said a fully-veiled female voter. “As an Islamic voter I came to practice my right and support our allies.”

Tamam Fasid, a female voter, accused some groups of flying voters in from abroad for Sunday’s election. “They are painting a false picture of Sidon that contradicts the city’s history,” she said.

In Jezzine, where the army’s presence was less obtrusive, rival lists vied – albeit more calmly than in Sidon – for voter support. The Change List backed by the Free Patriotic Movement and local official Camille Serhal ran against the Jezzine is Beautiful list, backed by Lebanese Forces and Phalange parties and former MP Samir Azar.

An election monitor from the Lebanese Association for Democratic Elections said that while Sunday passed relatively calmly in Jezzine, a greater army and ISF presence was desirable.

“There have been no problems but there is a lack of security forces,” he told The Daily Star on condition of anonymity. He added that he had seen several incidents of vote buying among the electorate.

“That was spotted during the morning, but we documented the issue and it was dealt with quickly,” he said.

Neither polling station visited in Jezzine center had disabled access.

Rima Katar, who was with her disabled mother, said that the pair were determined to vote regardless of poor facilities.

“The old municipality was not [made up of] bad people, but I am voting for [the Change List] because I want better development. Here is an example of where change needs to happen,” she added, gesturing to her mother’s wheelchair.

Voter turnout in Jezzine hit 62 percent, according to Interior Ministry statistics, and many Jezzine residents were keen to point out their deep-rooted links to the town.

“I have lived in Jezzine for 20 years,” said Mariam al-Asmar. “During the hard times and the worst situations, Samir Azar never left the town. The other guys showed up 10 months ago and want to impose their will on residents.

“They are splitting families, turning brothers against each other, just for these elections.”

Thousands of Lebanese troops try to stop poll violence

thenational.ae

May 23. 2010

SIDON, LEBANON // The Lebanese armed forces deployed nearly 20,000 security personnel throughout the coastal city of Sidon yesterday in an effort to separate supporters of two rival factions that had clashed on several occasions in the weeks leading up to yesterday’s municipal elections.

Despite the massive security presence, which included two battalions of army infantry and special forces units backed by dozens of armoured personnel carriers, supporters from the prime minister Saad Hariri’s movement repeatedly clashed with partisans loyal to a local power broker, Osama Saad. Mr Hariri’s cousin, Ahmed, is heading a list of candidates attempting to remove Mr Saad’s representatives from Sidon’s municipal government.

Local television reported one person had died and at least a dozen were injured. Hundreds of young men from both sides were arrested as soldiers fanned out throughout the city in an effort to quell the tensions that have been rising between the political rivals since an effort to agree on a compromise list of candidates failed earlier in the week, leaving the elections wide open for one side to dominate the other.

The clashes, along with heavy-handed tactics by the army, which is widely seen as poorly trained and ill-disciplined, led local residents to fear that Sidon, a normally quiet majority Sunni city south of Beirut could explode into violence once the results are announced and the military lockdown is eased. The results of the vote were expected to come in over night.

“The army can do anything they want, they have been told by the government to shoot anyone that causes trouble here today,” said Mohammed Hanafi, a local resident, who watched in disgust as a large cluster of soldiers pointed automatic weapons at a family watching a street clash from their apartment balcony. The soldiers could be heard repeatedly threatening to shoot anyone seen filming the clashes and in one instance cocked their automatic weapons and demanded that one resident throw a camera-phone from a window to the soldiers or they would open fire.

“Sidon could explode,” Mr Hanafi said. “Either the army will shoot someone and start a war, or they’ll leave and both sides will attack each other.”

One masked young man, who appeared to be a supporter of Mr Saad, said that he had taken part in several small fistfights earlier in the day but hoped to hurt some of Mr Hariri’s supporters after nightfall.

“No problem, it’s still early,” he said as he and several comrades retreated away from a corner being taken over by an army unit.

On three occasions yesterday, Lebanese military forces threatened to arrest, shoot, or beat a photographer from The National for merely carrying a camera near their deployments. At least two local newspaper photographers had their cameras either confiscated or smashed by the troops for filming activity on the street.

After one clash between supporters of Mr Hariri and Mr Saad near a high school, at least a dozen bound and hooded prisoners could be seen being transported from the scene in the back of military trucks, while three men were taken to nearby hospitals after encounters with security forces.

One man, who witnesses said had been beaten to death by soldiers armed with wooden sticks, was loaded into an ambulance. His body was limp but military personnel on the scene refused to answer questions about the man’s condition, while police stationed nearby prevented reporters from entering the local hospital. Local television later reported he had died.

Just before polling closed at 7pm local time, security forces were forced to intervene in a larger clash between supporters of the two sides outside a polling station within the Lebanese-Kuwaiti School near the city centre. There were also reports of sporadic automatic weapons fire crackling through the streets as darkness approached.

The heavy security presence and overall ill pall in the city stemmed from a series of incidents earlier last week. On Thursday, supporters of Mr Saad attacked workers setting up a rally for Mr Hariri’s party and later rampaged through the seaside cornice section of the town targeting stores thought to be owned by Hariri supporters. And on Friday, a grenade was found across from the home of Mohammed al Saudi, a political ally of the Hariri family.

Mr Saad on Thursday accused the Hariri family of vote buying and using the family’s large fortune to fly expatriate supporters into Lebanon from around the world, skewing the voting.

“We call on the cabinet and the interior ministry to act quickly to prevent any violations and to put an end to intimidating acts in order for the elections to run smoothly,” Mr Saad said, but Mr Hariri’s supporters responded that the allegations were designed to force the cabinet to cancel or postpone the elections they expected to win.

The interior minister, Ziad Baroud, who is widely seen as politically neutral in this polarised country, came to Sidon at midday to reassure voters that security was being maintained, despite a number of small incidents. He also assured Mr Saad’s supporters that their complaints would be investigated.

“We are keen on everyone’s safety … All electoral complaints will be dealt with,” he told local reporters.

Yesterday was the third of four municipal elections being held to elect local mayors and municipal council members. The elections are being held according to geography on consecutive Sundays to maximise the number of security forces available to contain Lebanon’s enthusiastic electorate.

~ par Alain Bertho sur 24 Mai 2010.

Publié dans émeutes, riots