Our priorities in Syria’s People’s Assembly

After a long delay, Syria’s first People’s Assembly since the fall of the Assad regime has convened. The circumstances of its formation may have been imperfect, but our duty as MPs is clear: to make it succeed for a people eager to remove the remnants of the former regime and build a new Syria.

Success will depend on the Assembly’s independence, serious co-operation with the executive and its ability to produce effective legislation. Its priorities must also be ordered with precision and purpose. We face the legacy of six decades of corrupt law-making, while the executive has had a head start of more than 18 months. During that period, necessity compelled the President to issue dozens of decrees which Parliament must now review.

Our work falls into three areas: establishing the Assembly’s foundations, drafting a permanent constitution and addressing urgent legislative priorities.

The Assembly must first complete the institutional groundwork required to operate professionally. At its inaugural sitting, it elected a Speaker, two deputies and a secretary under Article 28 of the Constitutional Declaration. It must now adopt its rules of procedure.

Around 30 MPs have already prepared a comprehensive draft through successive workshops, with comments and contributions from more than 10 Syrian legal and constitutional experts. The final text should be debated and approved within two weeks, rather than using the full month allowed under Article 29.

The Assembly must also prepare its own budget so that its committees can work effectively and have the resources they require. Responsibility for this rests primarily with the recently elected Assembly Bureau.

It must then scrutinise and approve the state budget for 2026. Without it, there will be both a legal problem and no clear benchmark against which to understand the Government’s work or judge its performance.

Drafting a permanent constitution is likely to take at least two years before the text can be put to a referendum. The greatest task will be conducting a genuine national dialogue and securing the broadest possible agreement among Syrians.

Revolutionary legitimacy alone is insufficient to appoint a constitutional committee, while present conditions make it impossible to elect a separate body with the necessary mandate. The People’s Assembly is therefore the only institution combining revolutionary and electoral legitimacy, despite the executive’s direct and indirect role in its creation.

A constitutional committee comprising one tenth of the Assembly would be sufficiently broad to represent the different sections of Syrian society.

The legislative programme cannot be completed in one parliamentary term. Over the next six months, we must concentrate on several urgent priorities:

Transitional justice. A comprehensive law must establish political exclusion measures and restructure state institutions, especially the security services and armed forces, so that they can never again become instruments of oppression.

It must also compensate marginalised and injured groups, using positive measures to remedy the lasting effects of tyranny. Success would help Syria advance towards civil peace and achieve social unity alongside political unity.

Political and civil rights. Exceptional laws that enabled the security services to overreach must be repealed. Citizens must also be helped to understand their rights. The relationship between citizen and state must be rebuilt so that the state serves its people and advances society.

A modern political parties law is especially urgent after decades of political desolation. Emerging parties need time to organise and present their programmes. Modern laws governing civil-society organisations and religious endowments are also required.

Judicial reform. Corrupt judges must be replaced, the judiciary expanded and legal procedures shortened, potentially through a substantial revision of the Code of Criminal Procedure. Much of the inherited judicial system suffers from corruption, institutional decay and an inability to meet contemporary needs. The Ministry of Justice has taken encouraging steps, but much remains to be done.

The security services must also be subjected to judicial oversight. Any provision allowing citizens to be detained, or their property searched, without judicial authorisation must be repealed or amended.

The economy. MPs need a clear understanding of the Government’s still uncertain policy on growth, investment and reconstruction. Parliament should support sound economic proposals while legally protecting Syrian workers and domestic production.

Victims of the revolution must be helped into the labour market, while those who took part in it should be integrated into the economy. The public sector should be preserved and transformed from decay into effective production.

Education and culture. Education requires radical modernisation, beginning with its fundamental aims. Laws governing private and university education must be updated, and teaching linked to Syria’s development plans while preserving the country’s values and identity.

The quality of legislation. A dedicated parliamentary committee should review Syrian legislation throughout the transition, removing contradictions, improving efficiency and preparing the law for the digital age. It should also amend provisions deemed wholly or partly incompatible with Islamic law. Some studies put their proportion at 27.4 per cent of the Civil Code and 51.6 per cent of the Penal Code.

Parliamentary scrutiny. Scrutiny must extend across the state, including the Sovereign Fund, Investment Authority, Development Fund and the authority overseeing land and sea ports, as well as other bodies expected to drive Syria’s recovery.

Oversight need not hinder investment, development or reconstruction. Properly exercised, it will prevent institutions from straying from their mandates, protect citizens’ rights and ensure that public money is neither stolen nor wasted.

That is how Parliament can help lay the foundations of a just, united and prosperous Syria.