Beirut, May 30: Saad Hariri, the young Saudi-born son of the late Rafik Hariri, and, like his father, a Saudi Passport holder, won an unprecedented 92.3% of the official number of total votes cast in the First Electoral District of Beirut on Sunday. Two of His associates on the list, Ammar Al Houri, a dentist, and Jibran Tueini, publisher of the daily An-Nahar, received 71.8% and 71.4% of the votes, respectively. The size and significance of the victory has to be appreciated in the context of the total votes and the surprisingly sharp decline in turn out in 2005 in comparison to 2000. The official total number of votes in the First District in 2005 is 135,435, an increase of 6.26% over the 127,435 figure for 2000. The total votes cast in the district in 2000 were 51,221 which declined to 42,801 in 2005. In percentages the turn out in 2000 came to 40.2% while the turn out in 2005 is only 31%, a decline of 22.4%. The results were largely predictable due the personal bond established over many years past between the late Rafik Hariri and a hard core of followers who benefited regularly from his largess, the claim laid by Saad to his father’s political legacy by the declared decision of the Hariri family, and the lavish and high tension emotional advertising campaign capitalizing on the sympathy generated by the Hariri murder. Saad Hariri strongly suggested that the object of his candidacy was to get the murderers of his father. This was taken by many of his opponents as a serious accusation against whoever dared to oppose his candidacy. A larger decline in the turn out was also registered in the second and third electoral districts of Beirut, with total votes cast in the city shrinking to 116,560 out of the official total number of voters of 423,625, i. e. 27.5%. The total number of parliamentary seats from Beirut is 19; hence the results of the elections show an average of 6,135 votes cast for every winning candidate. All the 19 winning candidates ran on the lists publicly named after the late Rafik Hariri and fully sponsored by his family.