In kicking off his presidential campaign, he declared that only the Lebanese army is entitled to bear arms and defend the country.

Here are some highlights of his presidential platform.
Lahoud called for:

Enrolling Hezbollah fighters into and under the command of the Lebanese army insisting that only the army should be the "legitimate armed forces of Lebanon"

Training Lebanese army and supplying it with all the equipment needed to properly defend the country .

Establishing friendly , but balanced relations with Syria. Lahoud called for mutual respect of sovereignty , independence and freedom between Lebanon and Syria and also called for diplomatic relations and demarcation of the borders between both countries.

Lahoud also called for reforms against corruption , improved rights of women, improved standard of education in the public schools, reviving the Labor Unions and political freedom .

He expressed his frustration with the current crises and called for ending the current sit- in protest and the closure of the parliament


Unlike Emile Lahoud, Nassib lahoud is a leading member of the March 14 alliance . In 2001, he joined the Qornet Shehwan Gathering, regrouping prominent Christian opposition figures under the patronage of Maronite Patriarch Nasrallah Boutros Sfeir.

By announcing his candidacy at the Biel center in downtown Beirut , Nassib Lahoud , is joining a long list of declared candidates which includes:

MP Boutros Harb
MP Robert Ghanem
Prof. Shibli Mallat
MP Michel Aoun

And undeclared candidates

MP Nayla Moawad
MP Samir Franjieh
Michel Suleiman
Riad Salameh

Nassib Lahoud, a prominent Lebanese politician was born on 23 November 1944 in Baabdat - Metn region of Mt. Lebanon. After finishing his engineering studies in the United Kingdom, he founded Lahoud Engineering Co. Ltd., whose activities are mostly centered in the Middle East.

His backstage participation in the Taif conference in Saudi Arabia, which ended the destructive Lebanese civil war, made him ambassador to the United States of America. In 1991, he was appointed Maronite parliamentarian of the Metn region. He was later re-elected in organized legislative elections in 1992, 1996 and in 2000.

From the beginning of his political life, he situated himself in the opposition to the pro-Syrian governments that ruled the country. He opposed the economic policies of the late prime-minister Rafik Hariri and to Syrian interference in the Lebanese political scene. He voted against the constitutional amendments imposed by Syria to extend the mandates of presidents Elias Hrawi (in 1995) and Emile Lahoud (in 2004).

In 2001 he founded along with about two hundreds and fifty Lebanese intellectuals the Democratic Renewal Movement. A movement that presents itself as a reformist and opposition political movement. Despite being defamed by traditionalists, and populists, Lahoud and the DRM are extremely respected among intellectual circles.

He was a prominent figure of the anti-Syrian opposition movement that started to organize itself after the extension of the pro-Syrian president Emile Lahoud's term and which gained more political weight following the assassination of Rafik Hariri on 14 February 2005.

The Democratic Renewal Movement is part of the March 14 Alliance, an anti-Syrian coalition. Nassib Lahoud ran for elections as an MP in the 2005 legislative elections in his Metn district but lost against Michel Aoun's Free Patriotic Movement and his pro-Syrian allies

Since 1955 Nassib Lahoud has been considered to be the most serious candidate for the presidency. His willingness to run for the presidency is part of a wider campaign to remove the pro-Syrian president Emile Lahoud (his cousin) who is widely considered to be the last bastion of Syrian hegemony over the country.

Sources: Ya Libnan, Wikipedia