In the stock market of names trading within the portfolios of the post-election Syrian government, nothing is certain, nothing is excluded, the process will not be devoid of some surprises. This is the goods the son inherited from the father.
There is no place for the opposition in this market, especially those who declared a boycott of the elections, including the National Coordination Commission and the State-building Movement. But it is possible, though improbable, that the National Work Commission may get a share, especially that it hardly does any work on the "reconciliation". A secondary role might be given to one of the figures who returned to "homeland" marked as "independent opposition".
It is almost certain that Vice President Farouq al-Sharaa will be officially retired, though he has actually been retired since the beginning of the crisis, to be replaced by Walid al-Moallem, in a position more like an end-of-service award.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs is the most exciting portfolio and will be either Moallem's assistant Faisal Miqdad, or the representative of Syria in the United Nations, Bashar Jaafari. It is unlikely that Presidential Advisor Bouthaina Shaaban will hold this position, due to the sectarian-share policy adopted since the days of Hafez Assad, and especially amid rumors about the dispensing of Omran al-Zoubi from the Ministry of Information. He will perhaps be employed in another position, to be replaced by the Ambassador to Lebanon, Ali Abdul Karim Ali.
It is known that the Information Ministry is essentially Alawite – with some exceptions- and the norms of the mafia says that Alawites cannot take two major ministries.
The possibility of giving the Ministry of Interior to the ambassador expelled from Jordan, Major General Bahjat Suleiman, complicates the situation more. If the predictions come true, they would undermine everything followed in the past, and undermine the "sectarian-share" principle as well.
Some say that it is more likely that Suleiman will replace Ali as Ambassador to Lebanon, a move that could be understood in the context of harmony with the presidential elections in Lebanon, and the need for a person as arrogant as Suleiman, with his history of interference in other countries, as happened in Jordan.
It is natural, and expected that the presidential candidate Hassan Nouri will take an economic position, perhaps as Deputy Prime Minister for Economic Affairs.
Remarkably, rumors related to the names that may hold the position of the prime minister in particular, have disappeared, despite the media leaks that suggested his replacement that gave an impression that there will be something new in Assad's third term. The Ministry of Defense remains useless and is well suited to Fahd Jassem Freij, especially that Qassem Suleimani and the Generals of Iranian Revolutionary Guards are leading the military operations directly.
Translated and edited by The Syrian Observer
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