The dispute over presenting the watch reflects the fragility of the relationship between its components
Today, Lebanon is entering the “two times” stage, after a Christian majority rebelled against a government decision to postpone the adoption of daylight savings time until after Ramadan, amid political tensions that took on a sectarian nature that reflected the fragility of the relationship between the components, and prompted Prime Minister Najib Mikati to cancel a session of his government that was scheduled for today.
The dispute took the form of a sectarian division, as the voices of officials in Christian political forces rose in rejection of the government decision, and audio clips and data were circulated confirming the adherence to universal time in several Lebanese regions and rejecting the decision to postpone the transition to daylight saving time until after Ramadan.
The General Secretariat of the “Lebanese Kataeb” party asked all workers in the central house to “commit to coming to work according to the approved universal time, and not to adhere to the postponement of the adoption of summer time issued by the presidency of the Lebanese government.” He said in a statement, “All party meetings will be held on the specified dates, according to the new summer time.” LBC, MTV, and Voice of Lebanon radio, affiliated with the Kataeb Party, also announced that they did not comply with the government decision, while the Maronite Patriarchate issued a statement confirming the commitment to advance the clock by one hour at midnight, Saturday-Sunday.
Mikati, in turn, refused to give any sectarian character to the step, which he described as an “administrative procedure,” stressing that “some want to divert attention from his obstruction of the election process (for the president of the republic), or his failure to secure the required consensus to complete this merit, by targeting the government again.” Considering that “we are witnessing an attempt to drag the country into a sectarian division to fuel conflicts, and to give a purely administrative procedure an obnoxious sectarian turn.”
Political differences divide Lebanon into two times
Source: aawsat