Put diplomatically, in Lebanon it’s what you are that counts

A Shiite Muslim in Lebanon’s diplomatic corps can forget about being appointed ambassador to Washington. The same goes for a posting in London for a Maronite Christian.

And there’s absolutely nothing that can be done about it.

“I was told there were no vacancies for Maronites, so I spent eight years waiting for one to open up,” one former envoy told AFP, requesting anonymity.

She has since been posted overseas.

Her plight reflects the omnipresence of political confessionalism in Lebanon, a tiny Mediterranean country that is home to no less than 18 sects, and where religion may well outweigh merit in the workplace.

Two-thirds of the Lebanese population is Muslim, split almost equally between Sunnis and Shiites. Maronites, loyal to the Vatican, form the vast majority of the Christian population, estimated altogether at some 30 per cent.

“It’s like bartering,” researcher Mohammed Shamseddine of the independent consulting firm Information International said of the diplomatic job market.

“These patterns reveal that even the aftermath of the civil war is not yet over,” Mr Shamseddine said.

Confessional loyalties played a major role in Lebanon’s 1975-1990 civil war, a sectarian bloodbath that initially pitted Sunni Palestinians and leftists against Christians.

The war ended with a “no victor, no vanquished” settlement and saw a constitutional amendment that formalised the division of power along religious lines, granting Muslims and Christians equal shares in the 128-seat Parliament.

And while the amendment also eradicated the division by religion of posts in the state administration, two decades later the sect to which a Lebanese belongs remains a primary factor in getting a government job.

By long-standing tradition, the country’s top posts are divided among the country’s three largest confessions: the President is a Maronite, the Prime Minister a Sunni and the Speaker of Parliament a Shiite.