PM Mikati's urgent move: Unraveling the puzzle of General Aoun's term extension

The rush of the Caretaker Prime Minister, Najib Mikati, currently in Geneva, to handle the file of the tenure of the army commander, General Joseph Aoun, raised questions and suspicions at the same time.

This article was originally published in and translated from Lebanese newspaper Nidaa Al-Watan.

He appeared to be in a hurry to call for a cabinet session on Friday to approve the postponement of General Aoun's retirement for six months.

Simultaneously, Defense Minister Maurice Selim, close to the Free Patriotic Movement, still refuses to sign the decision to postpone the retirement.

It seems as if Mikati is giving with one hand to postpone the commander's retirement and covering with the other hand the challenge that is ready at the Free Patriotic Movement to refer it to the Council of Shura.

What reinforces the questions and suspicions about Mikati's "sudden" behavior is that he came to block the efforts to extend the term of the "commander" in Parliament through a bill extending it for a year.

This action would preemptively dismiss the pretext of the Defense Minister's signature.

So, are there any data that explain Mikati's behavior?

However, sources of the Grand Serail justified amid the controversy over the sudden government involvement in the extension issue. Nidaa Al-Watan was informed that approving the item to postpone the retirement of the army commander for six months will allow General Aoun to remain in service for half a year. 

Meanwhile, if filed, the appeal before the Council of Shura will not see the light before this period.

Contrary to this "reassurance" that landed on Mikati in terms of achieving the extension for the commander, there is much for observers to beware of the danger of this twisted step that replaces the solution of reliable legislation with the solution of a government decision threatened with annulment.

Not to mention the harm that is being prepared for the position of the army leadership, as its frontlines appeared Tuesday in the 'audacious attack' launched by the head of the Free Patriotic Movement, MP Gebran Bassil, personally against General Aoun, requiring his accountability before the judiciary on charges of defamation and slander.


Commenting on Bassil's attack on the army commander, church sources confirmed to Nidaa Al-Watan that everyone has the right to speak, and Bkerke will not descend to this level of argument that harms and does not benefit.

They emphasized that Bkerke is interested in saving the entity, while others understand their settling of scores and settling scores with the army commander.

They also stressed that Bkerke is steadfast in its supportive position for the term extension, and neither Bassil's words nor others will change the position of the Maronite Patriarchate.

Furthermore, wide-ranging political sources told Nidaa Al-Watan, "There is information confirming the existence of a broad political and national opposition to exert pressure on Mikati not to proceed with the mysterious cabinet session on Friday. Given that this session means facilitating the extension for the army commander."

The sources also explained that Mikati could have held a similar session a month ago. Still, he did not do so because of Hezbollah's alleged concern about following Bassil, preventing the issue from being raised at the cabinet session. And it is known that the Secretary-General of the Council of Ministers, Judge Mahmoud Makieh, had prepared a legal study on this matter, including all possible proposals to avoid the vacuum, leaving it to the cabinet to make the appropriate decision.

Are there any developments that prompted the Prime Minister to return to the file of the term extension for the army commander in the Grand Serail and not in Parliament?

According to the information, Mikati wants the Friday session "to lift the responsibility of postponing the term extension, on the pretext that the one responsible for it later is Deputy Bassil."

The same sources also pointed out that the danger of what Mikati did is that he put himself in confrontation with the first Christian reference, i.e., the Maronite Patriarchate, in a clear challenge through "facilitating" the extension of the last remaining Maronite position in the state after the vacancies in the presidencies of the republic and the Central Bank governorship.

Moreover, General Aoun has become, in the eyes of international references, a symbol of national sovereignty in the most dangerous stage that Lebanon is going through.

The implementation of Resolution 1701, which is internationally proposed, will be linked to the presence of the current army commander. Lebanon's salvation from a destructive war looming in the south for weeks depends on this decision.