The results of Sunday’s parliamentary polls in Lebanon revived an old dispute over the “righteousness” of the Shiite sect to hold the Finance Ministry portfolio in the next cabinet lineup. Speaker Nabih Berri is attached to his position of maintaining this particulate portfolio to one of his Amal Movement officials. Prime Minister Saad Hariri, however, alluded this week that he opposed offering the portfolio to the Shiites. The Free Patriotic Movement expressed a similar position by refusing the policy of dedicating a sovereign portfolio to a particulate sect. Berri has already secured guarantees over his position as speaker, a role he has occupied since 1992. Once he is officially re-elected by the new parliament, political blocs will hold consultations with President Michel Aoun over the appointment of a new prime minister, who will form the new government. Contrary to the “positive atmosphere” expected to accompany the cabinet lineup procedure, a crisis will likely loom over which sect would get the Finance Ministry. “The Finance Ministry is for the Shiite sect,” Berri declared on Tuesday. Hariri later indirectly responded to the Speaker’s statement by saying: “We can put all the disputes aside, the important thing is the country, we should stop returning to old ideas like the half, two-thirds, or the ‘king minister’ within the government. All this has no place in the country.” “We can do everything when there is political consensus over major issues,” he added. According to political norms, Lebanons sovereign portfolios (Interior, Foreign, Finance and Defense ministries) are divided among the four main sects: Sunnis, Christian Maronites, Shiites and Christian Orthodox. Law professor Wassim Mansouri told Asharq Al-Awsat, however, that the Lebanese Constitution only stipulates dividing parliament, cabinet portfolios and first rank public posts equally between Christians and Muslims. The constitution demands that the president be a Christian Maronite, the speaker a Shiite and the premier a Sunni.