FPM MP Ibrahim Kenaan said Aoun's bloc will vote in parliament irrespective of whether agreement is reached on a candidate. In an interview with Naharnet, he appeared unwilling to acknowledge he was part of the "opposition", and refused to call Hizbullah an "ally".MP Ibrahim Kenaan, secretary of the Change and Reform Parliamentary bloc, said that if legislators failed to reach consensus on a presidential candidate "we can still vote in parliament" irrespective of who wins or loses. Kenaan, in an interview with Naharnet, said that Free Patriotic Movement leader Michel Aoun is the bloc's candidate for the presidential office, but failed to identify him as the opposition candidate. Hizbullah, according to Kenaan, "is not an ally" but rather "a partner in the homeland."
At the risk of reading too much into this statement, cracks in this "non-alliance" between Aoun and Hizbullah have emerged over the past couple of weeks, following a Hizbullah statement that Aoun was "not the only candidate". A Nasrallah speech extolling Aoun's character without naming him or committing to his candidacy seems to have failed in impressing the general, who is not stupid enough to buy into Nasrallah's 11th hour proposal to change the constitution to allow for Aoun's election through a popular vote.
Aoun's movement is also under immense pressure by the Maronite church, which is close to excommunicating (at least in a patriotic/political sense) Christian MPs who heed Hizbullah's call to boycott the election. The talks between Hariri and Berri will probably reach a dead end, if they haven't already after Nasrallah's speech. At best they are designed to diffuse sectarian tension in the country. Sunni-Shia clashes in Beirut often go unreported by the media. But even if these talks produce a candidate, it will not be Aoun. And the general knows it. All he can do now is vote for himself.