US$50m projects in Syria draw ire

With large parts of the country ravaged by fighting and hundreds dying every week, the projects in the pro-regime stronghold of Tartus have sparked rare criticism from supporters of president Bashar Al Assad.

Syrians admire the new US$50 million (Dh183 million) Tartus Mall in Tartus, Damascus, a pro-regime and Alawite minority sect stronghold to which president Bashar Al Assad belongs. AFP Photo

BEIRUT // Even for some of the Syrian regime’s staunchest supporters, the launch of a glitzy new shopping mall and tourism projects seems to have been a step too far.

With large parts of the country ravaged by fighting and hundreds dying every week, the $50 million (Dh183.5m) projects in the pro-regime stronghold of Tartus have sparked rare criticism from supporters of president Bashar Al Assad.

It follows a series of unusual public expressions of frustration from regime supporters after the loss of hundreds of soldiers to ISIL and a bomb attack that left nearly 50 children dead in Homs.

The mall was opened by prime minister Wael Al Halaqi on October 9. It includes “seven restaurants, a playroom for children and shops”, a government press release boasted, announcing additional “tourism projects” in the city.

The project is a private investment, but has clear regime backing and has caused outrage.

“Ten billion Syrian pounds spent on a mall while injured soldiers are paying for surgery from their own pockets and eating nothing but potatoes and bread,” said a regime supporter on Twitter.

“Sixty per cent of the population of Tartus won’t be able to afford to shop there,” said another on Facebook.

Even someone who stands to benefit from the project, a tourism sector employee in Tartus, admitted it had caused some resentment.

The projects “ignore the feelings of the families of many soldiers from this province who have died”, the employee said.

Tartus has been spared the worst of the civil war, which has killed more than 180,000 people and forced nine million more from their homes.

Tartus and another coastal province, Latakia, are strongholds of Al Assad and the Alawite minority sect to which he belongs.

While not itself ravaged by fighting, more soldiers from Tartus have been killed in the conflict than from any other province in Syria. The regime has long regarded its coastal strongholds as deep reservoirs for recruiting to the army and pro-regime militias.

Faith in Mr Al Assad himself appears unshaken, but the rumblings have been growing and the shopping mall has become a focal point of criticism.

“The mall has opened and the families of the martyrs can take photos ... and the injured can benefit from sales on prostheses. Long live the nation!” said a sarcastic rant on a Facebook page called “The Forgotten Province of Tartus”.

The Syria Report website, which focuses on Syria’s economy, said there had been an “outcry from regime supporters” after the announcement.

“Although Tartus Mall is a private investment, ventures of that scale in Syria cannot take place without the backing of a regime official and are therefore perceived as being a source of enrichment for regime officials,” the site said.

Jihad Yazigi, director of the Syria Report, said the government’s decision to move forward with the projects was part of a long-term approach.

“The regime is trying to show through these projects that ‘everything is fine’, that the situation is under control,” Mr Yazigi said.

“That’s been its policy for three-and-a-half years” since the war began in March 2011, he said.

Mr Yazigi said Tartus had become a target for investors because its relative calm had attracted an influx of Syrians displaced from war-ravaged provinces like Aleppo and Idlib.

But what the city’s newcomers and residents seem to want most is an end to the bloodshed, and Mr Yazigi said Al Assad backers had become increasingly angry about government decisions after the fall of several army bases to ISIL fighters.

In August, ISIL seized the army’s last base in northern Raqqa province, killing an estimated 200 soldiers.

Grisly photos circulated of mass executions and beheadings of troops at the Tabqa base, raising the anger of government supporters who felt the impending militant advance could have been predicted and perhaps prevented.

Pro-regime supporters showed their anger on social websites, and some even sought to organise demonstrations against the defence minister, General Fahd Al Freij.

In September, five of those who took part in the criticism were arrested.

Further outrage from pro-regime Syrians was sparked by a devastating bomb attack on October 1 in central Homs against a school in an Alawite neighbourhood.

Relatives of nearly 50 children killed in the attack called for the resignation of the provincial governor in rare public demonstrations.

The criticism marks a rare crack in the regime’s bulwark of support.

“People don’t criticise Bashar Al Assad, either because they are afraid or because he is still for them their only option,” directing their anger instead at lower-level officials, Mr Yazigi said.

“After all this criticism, I think in the future the regime will think twice before getting involved in new projects.”

* Agence France-Presse