By Mohamed Ali Akman

BEIRUT 

Lebanon will hold parliamentary polls on May 8 next year, the Lebanese Interior Ministry announced Friday.

Lebanese nationals living abroad will be able to cast ballots in the period from April 22 to 28, according to a ministry statement.

It's last parliamentary election was in 2009. Since then, however, polls were postponed on two separate occasions owing to differences between the country’s main political forces.

Next year’s scheduled election will be the first since parliament elected Michel Aoun as Lebanon’s president in late 2016 after the post had stood vacant for more than two years.