Report: Parliament Convenes in 'Extraordinary' Session over Electoral Law

Speaker Nabih Berri plans to call the parliament to session before the month's end, to put and approve a final draft for the upcoming parliamentary elections, An Nahar daily reported Monday.

The step comes after President Michel Aoun signed a decree on Saturday to open an extraordinary parliamentary session aimed at pushing the rival political parties into agreeing on a new law before May 2017-- the scheduled date for holding the polls.

The parliamentary session is to begin on January 9 and ends on March 20, according to Saturday's statement issued by the President's media office.

Lebanon's political parties are bickering over amending the current 1960 election law which divides seats among the different religious sects.

The country has not voted for a parliament since 2009, with the legislature instead twice extending its own mandate.

The 2009 polls were held under an amended version of the 1960 electoral law and the next elections are scheduled for May 2017.

Hizbullah has repeatedly called for an electoral law based on proportional representation but other political parties, especially al-Mustaqbal Movement, have rejected the proposal and argued that the party's controversial arsenal of arms would prevent serious competition in regions where the Iran-backed party is influential.

Mustaqbal, the Lebanese Forces and the Progressive Socialist Party have meanwhile proposed a hybrid electoral law that mixes the proportional representation and the winner-takes-all systems. Speaker Nabih Berri has also proposed a hybrid law.