After numerous allegations of violations in Sunday's Beirut municipal elections, the Future Movement -backed Beirutis List is facing new trouble, this time from voters who claim the party stiffed them after promising cash for their votes.
The Daily Star reported that a protest was held outside of a Future Movement office in the Beirut neighborhood of Tariq al-Jdeideh Thursday afternoon by workers claiming they weren't paid for "work" performed during the elections. However, that article has now been removed and replaced with a story titled "Hariri hails municipal vote as victory for democracy," quite different than the original "Future campaign staff protest payments delays in Beirut."
However, Al Jadeed TV is reporting that it has protesters on tape admitting they weren't workers at all – but were voters who had been promised cash for votes.
"This is not a personal matter. ... I am just conveying what was said by the crowd today in Tariq al-Jdeideh, which shows in the videos and photos you are airing," Al Jadeed reporter Leyal Bu Musa said. "When we arrived early in the morning, there was no presence of arms, it was only people complaining that they didn't get the sums of money they were promised with, although they voted as they were asked and then they were cursing the Future Movement. The arms showed only when an attempt to take a video occurred."
The Saad Hariri -backed Beirutis List won Sunday's election, after fierce competition from the Beirut Madinati (Beirut is my city) list, a coalition of politically unaffiliated activists.
Beirut Madinati took 40 percent of the vote, an impressive result for the new movement after most political parties in Lebanon joined forces on Hariri's list. Due to the majoritarian system used for the election, Beirut Madinati will not receive a single seat on the 40-member council, despite winning one of the three districts of the city and performing strongly in a second.