Bekaa I
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
_-_Red.png)
Bekaa I (Arabic: دائرة البقاع الاولى) is an electoral district in Lebanon, as per the 2017 vote law. The district elects 2 Greek Catholic parliamentarians, 1 Maronite, 1 Greek Orthodox, 1 Armenian Orthodox, 1 Shia and 1 Sunni. The electoral district covers the qada of Zahle.[1] The electoral district retained the geographic boundaries and seat allocation of the Zahle electoral district from the previous electoral law.[1][2]
The electorate in the first Bekaa electoral district is predominately Christian.[3] Ahead of the 2018 elections, electoral district had 172,555 registered voters; 48,867 Sunni (28.32%), 27,538 Shia (15.96%), 906 Druze (0.53%), 32,295 Greek Catholic (18.72%), 27,049 Maronite (15.68%), 16,470 Greek Orthodox (9.54%), 8,604 Armenian Orthodox (4.99%), 6,646 Syriac Orthodox and Syriac Catholic (3.85%), 1,846 Armenian Catholic (1.07%), 1,349 Evangelical (0.78%) and 985 from other sects (0.57%).[1]
Political dynamics
Local politics in Zahle was for long been dominated by the Skaff clan, ever since the French Mandate administration chose to benefit the family in order to counter the influence of other local elites.[4] But the election of Zahle politician Elias Hrawi as President of Lebanon challenged the position of the Skaff bloc leader Elias J. Skaff. In the 1990s pro-Syrian forces opted to rally behind the city mayor and lawyer Nicolas Fattouch, creating an alternative bloc of political power.[5] During the elections of 1992, 1996 and 2000 the influence of the Skaff family gradually declined.[5]
