The Syrian Presidential election takes place today, 26^th May. Few people aside from Bashar Al Assad and his backers are taking them seriously. There is only one outcome that most are expecting. Like dictators of other countries and the past, Assad will no doubt obtain a large majority (somewhere around 95-99% of the vote tends to be a dictator’s norm). His deadly intelligence services, the Mukhabarat, will ensure there is a decisive victory for him. The other three handpicked candidates for President are insignificant and relatively unknown.

The Syria of today is a broken state. Its leadership, if one can call it that, is propped up by external backers, Russia, and Iran. A further portion of the country is under Turkish control, and the Kurdish regions have obtained a fair deal of autonomy.

The Syrian population is just under 18 million with an average age of 26, meaning that much of the population are too young to vote. Around 6.6 million refugees have fled to other countries and another 6.2 million are internally displaced within Syria, mainly in Idlib and the surrounding  areas under Turkish control. This equates to roughly half the population of pre-war Syria. The Syrian conflict has produced one of the worst refugee crises in recent times and will challenge settlement policies for sometime to come.

In a bitter war for a more accountable government, the Syrian people opposed their brutal Ba’athist regime , in a 11-year long civil war, in which many external actors have become involved.  Around 500,000 million Syrians have been estimated to have been killed, with many more casualties. Whilst Syrian expats in Lebanon have been bussed to the local embassy to vote, most of the Syrian people elsewhere will not be voting. This is an election without much of its electorate.

Not that it will bother Bashar al Assad. Having the support of your own people has never really mattered much to dictators. It is now 57 years since the Assad family (his father Hafez ruled before him) have forced their rule upon the Syrian people. They are adept at political survival. Although the Assad’s belong to a small minority heretical Alawite sect, they have managed to survive and enforce their rule over a large majority Sunni Muslim population (despite the Syrian constitution stating that only a Muslim can stand in elections for President). When faced with this obstacle to power in the 1980’s, Hafez Al Assad simply managed to get a Shia Lebanese cleric to provide a fatwa that the Alawite sect were now to be considered as Muslims. A fatwa rejected by Sunnis and most Shia.

Like his Ba’athist twin brother Saddam Hussain, Bashar al Assad will try to retain power until the bitter end. Both never really cared much for their people or country. They have been happy to see their people and countries destroyed, as long as they remained in power. Both were prepared to use whatever ideology was necessary as propaganda,to gain support for their rule. Both used ant-Western rhetoric as a rallying call. Ironically, whilst both championed themselves as leaders of a united Arab world, they would often be on the opposing sides on wars.

Like Assad’s broken country, the ideologies that have held Iraq and Syria together since  “independence” from European colonialism are broken. Ba’ath Socialism is dead, and it is also difficult to call yourself a champion of the Arabs and Arabism if the main allies propping you up in power, and and holding whats left of your country together are Iran and Russia.

Syria no longer effectively exists as a nation-state; its rulers and their allies do not represent or are accountable to its people. The Assad regime and its allies are trying to re-engineer the indigenous population, so it is no longer mainly Sunni Muslim.  Then what ? Neither Iran or Russia have the resources at present to rebuild Syria alone.

There are signs however, that the corporate real estate developers of the Middle East (particularly from among its ruling elites) have spotted the potential for profits through the rebuilding and reconstruction of Syria. It looks like some are looking to bring back Bashar Al Assad into the “Arab” fold, and he may well get the lifeline he needs. It is likely that instead of facing charges in the Hague for crimes against humanity, Bashar al Assad may yet rule what is left of Syria, for another seven years. Unfortunately for the Syrian people, their exile is likely to last longer. Wherever they are in the world they must not give up on political change and holding war criminals to account. In the long run political change will come to their land, but it may not look like the Syria of the past, and Allah (swt) is the best of planners.