Syria Makes Plans For First Elections Since Fall Of Al-Assad

A senior government official in Syria said over the weekend the country will hold its first elections since the fall of Bashar al-Assad in September. 

Speaking to state news agency SANA, Chairman of the Higher Committee for People’s Assembly Elections Mohammed Taha al-Ahmad said elections will be held between September 15 and 20 this year.

The elections will be held via electoral college in each parliamentary district, he added. One third of the 210 parliamentary seats will be appointed by the current interim president, Ahmad al-Sharaa. The electors in those colleges will be appointed by a committee formed by President Sharaa, meaning this assembly will ultimately be selected by Sharaa.

Syria is currently operating under a temporary constitution signed by Sharaa in March, which will govern the country alongside this temporary parliament until general elections can be held at a later date, potentially years from now. This constitution gives absolute power to the office of the president, and has been criticized by some as being unrepresentative and dangerous. 

Sam Dallah, a Syrian lawyer and legal expert who fled the country in 2012 after the outbreak of civil war, criticized the new constitution in an interview with France 24. 

“If the president directly or indirectly chooses the members of the People’s Assembly, appoints and dismisses ministers, and appoints the members of the Constitutional Court, what remains of the principle of the separation of powers?” Dallah asked.

The government has promised broad representation and pledged to allow foreign bodies to observe electoral committees overseeing the vote.

President Sharaa said in February that it will take four to five years to hold a presidential election, just two months after taking power in December 2024.

Sharaa said, “I estimate that the period will be between four to five years until elections because there is a need for a vast infrastructure, and this infrastructure needs to be re-established and establishing it needs time” in an interview on Syria TV.

One complicating factor in the timeline of holding elections in Syria is how little population data the Syrian government has at its disposal. A massive refugee crisis beginning in 2011 has led more than 14 million Syrians to be displaced, 6.6 million having fled the country. More than 500,000 Syrians have returned to the country since Sharaa overthrew Assad. The government plans to use a 2010 census, according to a statement in June by Ahmad.

Sharaa said that without solid demographic data, “any elections held will be doubted.”

Additionally, peaceful popular elections would be threatened by ongoing military conflict in Syria. Since mid-July, clashes between Bedouin clans and Druze militia groups have raged in southern Syria, particularly around Suwayda. These conflicts have seen several hundreds killed, the Israeli military intervene in the region, and reports of Syrian government troops joining the Bedouin clans and executing Druze.

Israel’s military intervention escalated to a bombing of the Syrian capital of Damascus on July 16, targeted at the military headquarters.