BEIRUT (AFP) -- Lebanon in less than three weeks faces uncertain presidential polls in Parliament, with its feuding political parties at daggers drawn over choosing a consensus candidate.

Although Parliament speaker Nabih Berri has called for a special session of the deeply-divided legislature on September 25 to pick a successor to pro-Syrian President Emile Lahoud, it remains unclear whether the election will actually take place.
The 128 deputies have from September 25 to November 24 to elect a president, who in accordance with tradition is drawn from the country's Christian Maronite community.
However, from November 14 until the end of Lahoud's mandate, Parliament will be in permanent session.
The September 25 meeting will mark the first time since last October that lawmakers have gathered.
--------Opposition allies
Berri in past months has refused to convene Parliament after six of his opposition allies resigned from the government, plunging Lebanon into its worst political crisis since the end of the 1975-1990 Civil War.
Analysts said that by calling a session for the first time in nearly a year, Berri was putting pressure on the Western-backed majority and placing the ball in their court.
""He is trying to show that he himself is not an obstruction,"" said Paul Salem, director of the Carnegie Middle East Center in Beirut. ""We can almost call it a tactical move, it's like a move in a chess game.""
Joseph Maila, a respected Lebanese political scientist, said the upcoming parliamentary session may prompt deputies from the ruling majority to agree on a consensus candidate or risk being accused of plunging the country into further chaos.
""He (Berri) is trying to move forward the political process and pushing deputies from the majority to go into action,"" he told AFP.
Berri last month also raised the stakes by saying that opposition parties were willing to drop their demand for a national unity government on condition Lebanon's feuding factions agreed on a candidate for the presidency.
He insisted, however, that the president would have to be elected by a two-thirds quorum in Parliament.
The ruling majority and the opposition, led by factions allied to Syria, are at odds on whether the president is elected by a two-thirds quorum or by a simple majority.
Sami Salhab, a law professor at Lebanese University, said the constitution was very clear on the number of votes required and the quorum issue was part of tradition rather than a constitutional requirement.
""Article 49 is very clear,"" Salhab said. ""In the first round, the president must be elected by two-thirds of the 128 deputies and after that by half the deputies plus one, meaning 65 deputies.""
The majority controls 69 seats in the 128-seat Parliament.
Carnegie's Salem said that the rival parties would likely wait until the 11th hour to strike a deal amid much ""behind-the-scenes"" wheeling and dealing.
He also pointed out that two key players, the United States and Lebanon's former powerbroker Syria, had yet to enter the fray.
""You really only have two scenarios: either there is agreement on the president ... or we have division"" and that means each side picks a president, he said.
The latter scenario, experts say, would spell ""catastrophe"" and would be a grim reminder of the final years of the civil war when two competing administrations battled it out.
If a new president is not elected, his powers would automatically be transferred to the government headed by Prime Minister Fuad Siniora. But Lahoud has said he could appoint army chief Michel Sleiman as premier