What We Can Learn from Historic Thawra Victories in All Major Universities

Gino Raidy
Gino’s Blog
Published in
7 min readDec 6, 2020

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Before we begin, please allow me to congratulate the young men and women who have made us all incredibly proud the past couple of months. You boys and girls have stepped up at a time that feels more like lost time as the cartels still holding onto power illegitimately bide their time with the false hope that Biden will be their savior (he won’t).

The Significance of these Landslide Victories

It feels like it goes without saying, but it’s important to pause and reflect on what wins in universities like AUB, LAU, USJ and RHU mean in the grand scheme of things.

At its core, the relevance and hope these elections give stem from disproving the broken record we hear constantly, mostly fostered by those in power hoping to keep us all hopeless in any meaningful change.

“They’ll Just Vote for the Same People”

Who hasn’t heard at least a couple dozen times: “nothing will change, tomorrow they will all go vote for the same people” or some version of this. Even some that were part of the Thawra since day one, fall back to this facile and lazy conclusion.

It makes sense at face value, the same war criminals and thieves keep getting the same votes, they just switch around their alliance-of-conveniences every US administration.

However, if we consider the gerrymandered districts, the constantly-changing electoral laws that are tailor-made to ensure serial election losers like Gebran Bassil finally get elected into an office (instead of appointed by force by his father-in-law). Add to that the disastrous Interior Ministries that run those elections and the thousands of cataloged violations under Nohad Mashnouk’s watch that went by as if nothing happened, potentially changing the outcome of one or two parliamentary seats, but more consequentially, eroding people’s faith in elections as a means of change. After all, even if you do win, they’ll just switch the ballot boxes, right?

The Beirut Madinati 2016 Anomaly

Something happened in 2016 that I feel doesn’t get enough attention. Beirut Madinati, an independent campaign that coalesced after 18 months of You Stink movements, got more than any political party in Beirut (all of Beirut, not the Beirut 1/Beirut 2 districts like in parliamentary elections).

The ruling parties had to all come together, even though they’re supposed to be mortal enemies on TV and in their press conferences, to barely squeeze out a win in the winner-takes-all municipal elections.

However, the fact that a relatively new and untested group, managed to get more than 40% of the vote, forcing the Sulta to close ranks to ensure they still control the billions of dollars in Beirut Municipality (I’m assuming to keep repaving the same roads and destroying sidewalks).

This was the first time, at least in my lifetime, that we got a stellar electoral result.

The Universities Victories

A lot of people are quick to point out that these universities aren’t representative of all of Lebanon, and you’re right. Campuses on Bliss and the Mathaf might not capture the pulse in Akkar or Nabatieh 100%. Others will say that practically, student councils don’t have much of an effect on our day-to-day existence, and that’s also right.

However, the significance of these victories is as much a condemnation of the ruling elite, as it is vindication for the young men and women of the Thawra.

In AUB, most Sulta parties alleged they “boycotted” the elections once they knew they had no chance, and even trued to deploy their operatives as part of Thawra-adjacent campaigns to try and sneak them in and do a “Gotcha!” moment after the last ballot is cast.

In LAU, mortal enemies in the Sulta ganged up together to try and stop the majority winners from getting the executive positions. In other words, they chose to ally themselves, again, against the will of the majority of students. Just like their off-campus handlers do to the rest of the Lebanese people.

In USJ, parties like the LF and HA went all-out sectarian, deploying their thugs to cause violence and making sure cameras were present for the traditional sectarian talking points that seek to scare people into submission. “We can’t let Hezbollah take ‘Bashir’s university” and on the other side “You can’t talk about Nasrallah!”

It’s worked most of the time historically, stoking sectarian fears, but it’s become much less effective since last October. The younger generation isn’t as traumatized by the Civil War, and they’ve learned that this crippling fear of a bunch of invalid octogenarian war criminals is what got us into the mess we’re in right now.

The Shameful 3% in 2018

Talking about elections, we can’t not mention the disastrous 2018 one with “Kuluna Watani”. A lot of people take that as an example that Lebanese people will always vote for the establishment parties and militias.

This is unfair though, the coalition, which I backed because groups I aligned with were in it, took way too long to form with the usual ego problems making it more similar to Sulta parties coalitions that make absolutely no sense, but they do it for the sake of winning (or splitting) votes. Remember when Hezbollah and Lebanese Forces voted for the same list in some districts?

So, you had too many people that voters didn’t know well enough. Too many groups that didn’t have the same agenda, with groups like Sabaa and MMFD coming together with more liberal-leaning groups and locally influential movements.

In other words, it wasn’t convincing. It took too long, we didn’t know enough of the candidates and the fact that parallel lists in places like Beirut 2 and the Jabal districts made things even more confusing and less clarity of what we wanted to offer as an alternative.

Thankfully, after October 17 and now August 8, things that were an issue in the past, like Hezbollah’s hegemony on the rest of the Lebanese, is no longer a contentious issue. Everyone in their right mind who wants things to change for the better can’t keep Hezbollah in a box alone, instead of with all the other Sulta war criminals and thieves.

Koulouna Watani was a learning experience, and I think it taught us that “compromising” too much will not win us Sulta voters, it’ll only alienate people who would have otherwise voted for us. People want drastic, meaningful change, not snail-paced, safety-gloves-on approach to not piss off X or Y too much. The floodgates are open now.

More than Half Didn’t Vote

The 3% seems crushing in 2018, but then again, less than half of eligible voters actually showed up. Given that only 18 months later, hundreds of thousands of people swarmed every street and square, shows that the election results were not indicative of a comfortable majority for those in power.

Remember, so many of those that voted for them last time, won’t this time. Partly because, come on, how could you after everything they’ve done? But also, because they can’t bribe people like before.

Add to that the 50%+ of people that didn’t show up, and the chances become a lot more reasonable for new parties and candidates to overtake the octogenarian war criminals that have milked our country to the bone.

Don’t Compromise Too Much

I hear this “WHAT?! YOU WANT TO CANCEL THE PARTISANS?!” The answer is no, but the partisans can no longer cancel people like me and you anymore. They can run, and let them get as many seats as they can, and so will we.

However, this hand-extending to Sulta parties to not “upset” anyone or because we “need more time” for progressive ideas when it comes to social justice, gender equality and personal freedoms, won’t help us win.

Someone ultra-conservative and extremely in love with their leader, will not switch their vote if we’re polite and docile and don’t make them feel like we want change. However, someone on the fence that sees us succumb to pressure to not stand behind a gender equality agenda, or abolish Article 534 from the Lebanese penal code, or decriminalize marijuana use , will probably not get energized enough to go vote.

Worrying too much about banks, but not as much about minimum wage and healthcare for our most vulnerable, might get you a time slot on Marcel Ghanem’s show with Riad Salameh and a few Aounist MPs, but it won’t make someone who’s never voted go to the polls.

Form coalitions, make concessions with groups and people who share most if not all your goals, but don’t try to pander to Sulta voters, focus on your own voters and empowering them.

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