Cynical Syrians Prepare To Vote
George Bagdadi is a Syrian journalist who contributes to CBS News. He files this special report for CBSNews.com.
Syrians, or rather a few Syrians if assumptions are accurate, will go to the polls beginning Sunday to choose from almost 10,000 candidates for 250 parliamentary seats, of which 167 are already guaranteed for the ruling Ba'ath party and its allies. This occurs amid a noticeable lack of public enthusiasm for the 2-day elections, drawing campaigns by independent, rich businessmen who in reality can do nothing to change government policy.
Syrians can see election posters everywhere they look, mostly at random. Not even one political or economic platform was mentioned along with the pictures of most prominent independent candidates who appear in their suits and ties. Independents, who would only reserve 83 seats, have been allowed to run for parliament since 1990, a step that was meant to add a portrait of legitimacy to the People's Assembly.
As the story goes in election campaigns every four years, towns and cities across Syria are speckled with 'Madafat' (tents) set up by candidates where they offer food, soft drinks and narjilah, the immensely-common water pipe smoking device in the Arab world, but with no hint on what the candidates would do for the people when elected.
The state-run al-Thawra daily newspaper said a Presidential decree set the upper limit of expenditures for any candidate not to exceed three million Syrian Pounds (US$60,000), but only 20-30 percent of the elections runners abide by it. A candidate is requested according to the decree to present a detailed account of expenditures, otherwise his/her candidacy would be legally void and null.
Polling stations will open at 7:00 a.m. Sunday and will close at 8:00 p.m., reopening on Monday at 7:00 a.m. and closing at 2:00 p.m. for nearly 12 million eligible voters in the country's population of 19 million. [Syrian expatriates and army and police personnel are not allowed to cast their ballots.]
Observers predict the electoral process will get a weak turnout as it has failed to attract public interest.
"Why all of this money is spent on a pre-known result? Why don't you give the money to a charity? Take the names of the PNF candidates and their allies and relieve us of all this fuss and confusion," wrote one commentator on the 'Syrian News" electronic news bulletin, signing himself "The Oppressed."
Another commentator code-named Abou Sakhr said, "It's shame what is going on. … Is it not strange that we cannot find somebody who is apt for the parliament? Where are the good guys? Where is the state? Aren't the 180 seats booked in advance enough… whether we elect them or not?"
Opposition parties in town, as well as those in exile, including the banned Moslem brotherhood and the U.S.-based Reform Party, have called for a boycott of the polls. They claim the election is pure theatre that will be marked by "no democratic ground" and that is void of any issues of primary concern, such as political reform, human rights and relations with Lebanon.
They see that their announced demands for joining the elections, including the lifting of the martial laws — in force for more than four decades — and canceling Article 8 of the Constitutions — which stipulates that al-Baath Party is the leader of the State and society — were not met.
They say real power lies anyway with a small group of high officials tied to President Bashar Al Assad, who won a referendum — a Yes or No vote in 2000 — with an official vote of 97 percent. The new parliament will be responsible for nominating Assad for a second seven-year term in a popular referendum in June.
"The Baath Party has been giving no chance for other parties to come up in democratic ways. We have been calling for party plurality for years but in vain," Democratic Opposition spokesman Hassan Abdul Azeem said.
Azeem is one of the few critics who still have the courage to talk to reporters publicly, after the Syrian government rounded up and arrested many human rights activists and intellectuals in the last 12 months like never before.
Syria has been subject to intense international pressure since the murder of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri in February 2005 in Beirut, for which Damascus was widely accused. Syria denies the charges.
But Assad, a staunch opponent of the U.S. occupation of Iraq, is regarded as having recovered from an unsteady period of isolation. He appears to have patched up differences with Arab rulers and has welcomed an increasing flow of western politicians to Damascus, including the Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi.