THE TRUTH ABOUT PRESIDENTIAL DECREE NUMBER 16 By Ghassan Kadi 4 October 2018

THE TRUTH ABOUT PRESIDENTIAL DECREE NUMBER 16 By Ghassan Kadi 4 October 2018

THE TRUTH ABOUT PRESIDENTIAL DECREE NUMBER 16
By Ghassan Kadi
4 October 2018

Much has been said around Presidential Decree No. 16, but in reality, nothing has been said about its actual contents and context. When I began reading criticisms of it, they gave the impression that the Decree is handing over the Executive authority of Syria to the Clergy.  Videos made and posted by Syrian activists expressed grave concern about Syria following the footsteps of Saudi Arabia in imposing Shariah law on the streets of Syria. There are countless posts reiterating that they against the imposition of Shariah dress on Syrian women and other similar concerns and linking this to the Decree. There was also confusion about the origin of the Decree and a great deal of criticism of the Minister of Awkaf as the man allegedly being behind it all.

This soon developed into a wave of paranoia and fury that dragged in many normally sombre and serious analysts and activists into supporting the outrage and expressing deep concern and even anger against the government.

I observed all these developments with great concern, not knowing if they were based on any reasonable foundations because I did not really see the actual wording of the Decree in question. The confusion relating to the origin of the Decree, among other things, made it difficult to Google it, however I finally managed to find it.

To begin with, and contrary to the statements of many its critics, it is a Presidential Decree and not one originating from the Minister as these critics claimed. It is a 37 page document comprised of 7 sections and each section is divided into chapters. As I sat down to read it, I began to doubt if it was the actual document that the whole uproar was about. I therefore decided to write an Arabic extract of the main and relevant points it mentioned. The extract was quote-unquote based so that I do not use my own words. The emphasis was on matters of political power and religious power, whilst matters relating to financial management and the like were skimmed through very briefly.  The link provided herein is for the Arabic post I made. I am not going to translate this to English and I apologize for that. Those who are interested in an English translation can use online translators and whilst these services have their limitations, they are nonetheless good enough to relay the main underlying context.

In brief, the Decree does not separate the State from the Sunni Muslim institution, this is true. However, it puts the religious institution under the hand and authority of the Civil Government. This in my humble view, is a bold Presidential step towards secularism. The Decree imposes regulations for religious activities, teaching, preaching and other related matters, to ensure that extremism namely Wahhabism and Muslim Brotherhood are kept out and that Muslims are taught that they can be good Muslims and good Syrian citizens at the same time.

Sadly, experience has taught us that if religious institutions are left alone, they can be infiltrated by prejudiced fanatic zealots who can in the future, potentially reignite the fire. If anything, Decree no. 16 takes precautionary measures to ensure this doesn’t happen.

I did not see in the Decree any allusion to the imposition of Shariah code dress on women, and quite frankly, I did not see anything in it that justifies the outrage.

As I was in the beginning wondering if I was reading the actual document that had caused the outrage, I ended up wondering if the ones doing the outrage have read it at all or even bothered to try to google it and find it.

The War on Syria has not finished and over the years I have written many articles about directions that the enemies of Syria took it in order to morph the war and reshape it in their favour. What we now need is rationality and education. It’s a good start to have faith and confidence in the leadership and Decrees of the President, but this trust can be further bolstered by actually looking at facts and discussing the Decree for what it says and not by attributing it to the words of some extremist clerics and making judgements made on totally irrelevant criteria.

تحليل المرسوم التشريعي السوري رقم ١٦ بشأن وزارة الأوقاف

غسان قاضي

http://intibahwakeup.blogspot.com/2018/10/3-october-2018.html