Joseph Aoun, the New Lebanese President,  started parliamentary consultations on January 13, to form the government designating a prime minister tasked with forming a government desperately needed to tackle major challenges in the crisis-hit country.

Caretaker PM Najib Mikati and Nawaf Salam, a favourite of anti-Hezbollah lawmakers who is the presiding judge at the International Court of Justice in The Hague, have come up as the front-runners. The first round of discussions ended shortly before mid-day with a dozen oof independent lawmakers backing Salam, 7 picking Mikati, and 2 others selecting neither of them. The consultations as per a constitutional requirement, follow Aoun's election last-week in the midst of foreign pressure for swift progress - particularly from the U.S and Saudi Arabia.

The eastern Mediterranean countries  had been sans a president since October 2022, run by a caretaker govt amid a crushing economic crisis compounded by all-out war,  carried out by Israel against Hezbollah.

Under Lebanon's seat-sharing system, Lebanon's president is a Maronite Christian, the prime minister is a Sunni Muslim, and the speaker of parliament is a Shia Muslim. Salam's backers view the judge and the Ex-Aambassador to the U.N as someone impartial able to carry out much-required reforms.

The Independent lawmaker Khalaf Melhem said he had supported  Salam as someone outside the country's traditional political class so as to bring about  a change.
An independent member of parliament, Firas Hamdan, who also supported him, said lawmakers were being asked to opt between impunity and international justice, between clean hands and corruption.

Consultations came into the fore after Hezbollah was weakened by the war with Israel that closed on November month end, and thereafter after it lost a key union when opposition rebels toppled president Bashar al-Assad last month. The United States and Saudi Arabia were among major countries driving diplomatic efforts to end the presidential vacuum.
As per a confidential statement by the source, it said the incumbents' redesignation is part of the accord reached with the Saudi Arabia envoy to Lebanon, which led Hezbollah and Amal to vote for Aoun as president.

Mikati, who has already formulated  3  governments and has good relations with Lebanon's political parties and many foreign countries, has denied any such prior arrangement exists, while Riyadh has restored its interest in Lebanon's political scenery after years of distancing itself in protest at the influence of Hezbollah.