Can the Syrian national opposition bring about democratic change? Omayma Abdel-Latif seeks some answers in Damascus When the US State Department announced last month that it was allocating $5 million to fund opposition against President Bashar Al-Assad's regime, the response from the Damascus- based national opposition was remarkable. Accepting the money, they argued, would damage their credibility in the eyes of their own constituencies. While the forces of Damascus Declaration for National and Democratic change, an umbrella group for 12 Syrian opposition parties, welcomed international support for democratic change in Syria. However, accepting international funding for any project for change would render them subservient to their donors. The incident nonetheless shed light on the dilemma which the Syrian opposition is confronting in its pursuit of democratic change in the country: whether or not to accept Western -- and mostly US -- backing for their struggle against the regime. In addition the dilemma extends to the issue of whether or not to cooperate with the Syrian opposition in exile, now headed by none other than former vice-president Abdul-Halim Khaddam, who allied with Sadreddin Al-Bayanouni, leader of the Muslim Brotherhood in exile, to form the National Salvation Front (NSF). The dilemma was reflected in confusing and mutually contradictory statements issued by the Damascus Declaration forces in response to the Khaddam-Bayanouni alliance. One statement issued by the NSF called on all opposition forces inside Syria to cooperate with NSF in order to realise "the aspirations of our people to end the status quo and to build a new and free Syria." Last week, however, opposition forces in Syria had made it clear that they were distancing themselves from the NSF, when spokesman for the Damascus Declaration Hassan Abdul-Azim said the national opposition calls for democratic change through peaceful and gradual means but seeks no external affiliations. When the Damascus Declaration was announced in October 2005, it was considered a breakthrough development in the evolution of the Syrian opposition. It was the first declaration to bring together opposition forces inside Syria such as the National Democratic Gathering, the Kurdish Democratic Alliance and the Syrian Committee for Human rights. It also had the full backing of the Muslim Brotherhood. The declaration reflected a middle ground formula between national secular forces and the Brotherhood by affirming that Islam was the religion of the majority. One of the most noticeable features of the declaration, nonetheless, was the conspicuous absence of any reference to the US. "It was the first time that Islamists and secularists, Arabs and Kurds came together under one ideological umbrella to speak of radical change," Yassin Al-Hajj Saleh, a prominent Syrian analyst who served a 17-year prison sentence told Al-Ahram Weekly. But critics argue that years of oppression have rendered the opposition incapable of challenging the regime effectively. Countering such analysis, Saleh said: "any real democratic opening will mean the end of the regime because the regime is immune to any kind of reform. Mobilising people is no longer a decision just for the opposition to make. It is about a historical moment." Khaddam's Brussels declaration, some Syrian analysts argued, has further complicated the picture for Syria's national opposition. "Khaddam obviously wanted to lead the opposition to settle scores with the Syrian regime," Syrian human rights activist Haitham Al-Manaa said. "There was nothing new in the Brussels declaration that could answer to the Syrian opposition's demand for peaceful change." AL-Manaa described the Khaddam-Bayanouni meeting as "against the nature of things". Similar views on the alliance were aered by Riad Turk, one of the staunchest opponents of the Syrian regime, who has been jailed for 17 years. As Syria moves into a crucial year with presidential, parliamentary and municipal elections on the cards, a new law for political parties is set to be passed. Opposition figures, however, are not pinning high expectations that the law will lead to a break in the wall of despotism. On the contrary, many figures express a sense of disappointment as they take stock of four years of struggle to bring about change. "We wanted to believe that something has changed," said Habib Eissa, a founder of the Gamal Al-Atasi forum, one of the forums of the Damascus Spring. Eissa has just been released after serving a five-year sentence due to his political views. " Al-Muntadiyat (the forums) provided a platform for people to break the silence and speak up against the democracy deficit. But it was so short- lived." The Damascus Spring, an allusion to the mushrooming of forums where political issues were hotly debated between opposition groups and members of the regime, came to a halt, and most of the forums were shut down by the state. Al-Atasi forum nonetheless remained in operation. Eissa has applied for a licence from the Ministry of Social Affairs, and has meanwhile continued to hold seminars that are attracting a growing following. But "one flower does not make spring," Eissa said. He was arrested in September 2001 after a seminar in which an announcement from Al-Bayanouni was read to the public and which dealt with the issue of political reform in the country. "The prison years have confirmed my conviction that Syria deserves a free democratic system," he told the Weekly. Although Eissa and other dissidents believe that the opposition remains too weak to challenge the regime, he nonetheless thinks that the Damascus Spring period did not go to waste. One important development is that more and more people are "coming out of their shell of fear and are beginning to speak up in criticism of the status quo," he said. "The forums created an atmosphere whereby even the more apolitical are engaging in reform discourse. The problem is that popular discourse on reform has outdone that of the political forces." In Eissa's view, the Syrian opposition should capitalise on the popular mood. It was clear during Eissa's interview that the Damascus Spring dissidents were distancing themselves from the rest of the opposition forces. It was also clear that the "Damascus Spring Prisoners" as they came to be known in the media are contemptuous of any US intervention under the pretext of regime change in Syria. "I don't think the Americans have a scheme for democracy in Syria. They are not working for change, but rather to force the country to... serve US interests in the region," Eissa said. But one of the most important developments that forces of change in the country are facing is the rising tide of Islamisation of society, in a country that has prided itself on being secular for decades. The growing presence of Salafist as well as militant groups in Syria recently has certainly raised a few eyebrows, both locally and internationally. Until very recently, it hardly seemed likely that religious groups would be able to resurface after numerous massacres and cycles of oppression under the Baath regime. Years of oppression against the Islamists in Syria have rendered the Islamist opposition virtually non-existent. Since the 1982 Hama massacre which claimed the lives of thousands of Brotherhood members and supporters, the regime systematically rooted out sympathy for Islamists in the country. Law 49 issued in 1980 sanctions the death penalty as punishment for anyone who is found to belong to the Brotherhood. The changing times are, nonetheless, taking their toll on Syria. The rise of Islamists to power in different countries across the Middle East are certainly a factor shaping the evolution of any project for change in Syria, Saleh stressed. The new religious wave -- reflected in the spread of the veil among young girls as well as the growing influence of the religious establishment -- has different interpretations. Pro-government analysts explain this phenomenon as a fallout from the Iraq war, pointing out that Syrian society adheres to a centrist interpretation of the religion. Others attribute it to what they call a "Kurdisation" of the Syrian religious establishment, whereby top religious posts were mostly occupied by Kurdish figures during the 1990s. Still others beg to differ. "This could be interpreted as a silent rebellion by society, or at least segments of it, against the state or the regime. The political rebellion is disguised in religious attire," one journalist said. But Saleh thinks the tide of religiosity is apolitical. "There is an implicit agreement between the [Syrian] religious establishment and the state that politics and religion will not mix," he said. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Rebel with a cause Al-Ahram Weekly interviews prominent Syrian dissident Riad Seif in Damascus on the future of Syria's opposition Veteran Syrian dissident Riad Seif, aged 64, was released after serving a four-year prison sentence. Sitting at his home in the Sahniya district on the outskirts of Damascus, Seif, who was arrested briefly twice after his release, looked frail but defiant. He suffered health problems during his sentence. A former MP and one of the prominent prisoners of the Damascus Spring, Seif spoke to Al-Ahram Weekly about his project for peaceful change in Syria. The death of former president Hafez Al-Assad in 2000, according to Seif, provided the Syrians with a "golden opportunity" to right the wrongs committed under his rule and to move towards a more democratic system in Syria. "We -- the opposition -- decided to give [his son President] Bashar Al-Assad a grace period during his first term in office, which ends this year, thinking this would pave the way for a new constitution that would set rules for presidential elections due next year." Damascus Spring, a term coined to describe the mushrooming of forums where political and social issues were debated, was thus an attempt to translate the guarded optimism that swept numerous opposition circles into action. Introducing the culture of dialogue as well as concepts of civil society and human rights were a step on the road to political opening, Seif said. But he does not know why al-muntadayat, or the forums, were aborted in the budding. "Maybe the state feared that it could lose control over the kind of issues raised and the level of criticism so they had to shut them one after the other," he said, adding that the Syrian opposition has paid "a hefty price" for its attempts at democracy- building. "To ask for democracy in a country like Syria is like walking a minefield. The collective memory of Syrians still bears the scars of 30 years of oppression," said Seif. The popular will for change, in Seif's view, is not a sufficient driving force for change. "We should ask ourselves: is this a good moment for democratic change? I believe it is. But I know that the Syrians want to bring about a cost- free change. We don't want to pay the price the Iraqi people are paying for the change." The memory of the brutal suppression of opposition movements in the 1980s is still fresh in the minds of many Syrians -- the silent majority if you like. They are not prepared to undergo a similar sacrifice," he said. Syrians, he said, want the transition to be peaceful and violence-free. "Syrians don't make revolutions. Rather they make change happen slowly, on different levels." Seif also believes that post-9/11 regional and international changes will undoubtedly be among the driving forces of political evolution in Syria. Seif harshly criticised what he described as the regime's persistent attempts to "divert" the attention of the Syrian people from achieving democratic rule. "They act as though there is no alternative" to their rule, he said. He explained that any change in Syria will have to be spearheaded by the opposition inside the country. Commenting on the Brussels declaration, he said that one of the weakest points of the opposition in exile is its members' lack of a constituency inside Syria, and their failure to coordinate with other core opposition forces. Although Seif and the other members of the group of "Damascus Spring prisoners" consider themselves to be operating under the umbrella of the Damascus Declaration, he disclosed that they were seriously working to establish a new political party. Although he is anticipating the passing of a new political parties law, he said that what Syria needed first was a new constitution. Seif was reluctant to elaborate on details of the new political party but added that the two governing principles will be democracy and transparency. "The party will be representative of all segments of Syrian society and it will be a young party." Even members of the Muslim Brotherhood will have a place in the new party, he said, adding that they could represent the "conservative wing in the party". As for how he predicts the government will react to such a party, he said: "we are struggling to avoid any confrontations with the state, but this does not mean that we will succumb or be intimidated into silence again. As long as we are using peaceful means, we will prevail."
