The Minister of Interior and Municipalities, Judge Bassam Mawlawi, considered, in an exclusive interview with “Al-Hurra” channel, hours before the start of the Lebanese expatriate voting process in the framework of the parliamentary elections, that “what the head of the Supervisory Board for Elections, Nadim Abdel-Malik, said regarding paying bribes is dangerous and must be Notarized, and he must inform me and inform the public prosecutions, which will act immediately, but in fact, I did not personally inform any candidate of a documented bribery complaint, nor did I receive any complaint from the supervisory authority.” He said: “When the judge and the head of the supervisory authority say, that the There is bribery, or when he says that there is a crime, he must have evidence. Therefore, if the electoral supervisory body has any evidence, it should provide us with the documents to move and the public prosecutions.”
On the complaint of Representative Gibran Bassil to the Supervisory Board of the “Lebanese Forces” and “The Kataeb”, once morest the background of exceeding the financial ceilings for electoral spending in the media and , Mawlawi said: “The supervisory body did not inform me of anything.”
He continued: “The supervisory board started its work on January 15, 2022, and today we are in the month of May 5, and it did not appear to me that the supervisory board took any deterrent or any measure once morest any media outlet. I call on it to play its full role with decisions and measures, not Only through the media, and if the issue calls for the intervention of the judiciary, we put it with the judiciary, or with the Public Prosecution if the issue is related to bribery, and we put it at the Publications Court if it is related to media and . All the logistics, support and back-up for whatever you need.”
In response to the head of the supervisory board, who spoke of “financial and logistical difficulties facing the authority,” Mawlawi said: “There are no financial difficulties with the authority. We have secured a two-storey place for them in a building close to the Ministry of Interior, and also secured them the necessary funds, in addition to that I informed the head of the supervisory board. The commission is the readiness and readiness of the Ministry of the Interior to give the commission the necessary advance it requests, and we will fulfill it and give the full amount.”
In another context, Mawlawi revealed that “the problem of Lebanese voting in the Emirates has been resolved, and the consulate will be adopted as a polling center.” He explained, “After the complaints received regarding the consulate’s inability to accommodate the large number of registered voters, which approached 21 thousand, the consulate was well equipped and tents were set up in its garden, and the necessary preparations were made for the expatriates to vote without a problem and without trouble.”
He explained that “complaints received from more than one western country, such as France, have been addressed, and some amendments have been made to facilitate the voting process for citizens.”
After the turmoil in the process of distributing polling stations in Australia, Molloy pointed out that “the Consul General implemented the instructions of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs regarding the distribution of voters according to their residential address according to the postal code.”
Regarding the internal elections, Mawlawi spoke regarding “a decree that will be issued on Thursday, May 5, according to which voters inside the country will allow those who have an expired passport to vote in it following we have stamped it, in return for a financial allowance of 200 thousand pounds, just as happened with expatriates.” “.
He was asked regarding “security protections that some candidates enjoy while other candidates do not receive attacks, especially in the Bekaa and the south,” Mawlawi said: “The army was accompanying Minister Gibran Bassil on his tours in the north and Bekaa because he had information regarding opposition movements so that his visit would take place, and he, that is, The army intervenes wherever it finds it necessary to intervene. As for Sarafand, where opposition forces were attacked, the army and the security forces were not aware of the plot.”
The Minister of Interior confirmed that the parliamentary elections have been 100% and all the preparations have been completed in full, and that the security forces are fully prepared and will not be reluctant to play their role. in registration committees or in polling stations and polling stations.
