"Lebanese Rebels" Perforate Free Patriotic Movement Ranks
20 Aug 201411:37 AM
"Lebanese Rebels" Perforate Free Patriotic Movement Ranks

The Lebanese Rebels is a freshly established movement with a Facebook page featuring one of the most prominent change and Reform activists, Antoine Khoury Harb. Numerous questions have been posted while seeking to clarify the future of the Aounist movement.

 
"Will the Change and Reform movement endure under the patronage of its partisans and leader? Will MP Michel Aoun decide to think out of the box as opposed to preceding Maronite leaders? Will he establish a democratic, national and modern party that is tantamount to European ones? Or will he let the post-Aoun era wash out his movement's popularity? Will General Michel Aoun remain a political and national reference for generations to come? Does MP Michel Aoun believe that his political legacy shall be maintained by his family or his movement?
 


"We are not a separatist movement, but rather an opposing one," an FPM 'rebellion' who chose to remain anonymous told MTV Website, noting that the group's aim would be to turn the Change and Reform movement into an institution before it's too late.


According to the source, the Lebanese Rebels shore up the stance voiced by MP Michel Aoun's nephew Naim Aoun as published by Assafir newspaper a week earlier.


"We agree on everything that he wrote; Naim remains our main candidate for heading the Change and Reform movement," he stressed.


The group is scheduled to meet over lunch Akoura on Sunday, knowing that the Change and Reform movement has been turning a blind eye to the Rebels despite having many of them take part in sub-committees tasked with discussing the FPM's internal system.


"The General [Michel Aoun] thinks himself to be more important than the party. It is pivotal that the Change and Reform movement be morphed into an institution while he [Aoun] is still alive," the source said. "We have met with Aoun during the past two weeks, yet, no real progress has been made."
 


"For him [Aoun], nothing surpasses the sound of the current battles as he considers that the focus remains on pressing ballot votes, most prominently the presidential elections," he added. "We are just a parish that will perish with the passing of its leader; we are a majority within the movement and we have managed to garner the sympathy of most of the lawmakers, belonging to the Change and Reform as well as Free Patriotic Movement."


On a last note, the anonymous speaker praised Foreign Minister Gebran Bassil as a minister, dismissing, however, his leadership skills as a potential head of the Free Patriotic Movement.