Import Export: Assad and no end

Syria voted again. Bets have been made on social media as to what percentage Assad will get this time. The “Adopt a Revolution” initiative even put out a competition to win a cup. There is a joke I read a few days ago that I don't want to withhold from you: a Syrian goes to the polls. On the way home, he remembers that he accidentally did not vote for Assad. He turns back and says he would like to correct his mistake. The election officer on it, no need, I've done that a long time ago. Bashar al-Assad, that's this ophthalmologist who made it to dictator and, at 55 years of age, still looks like a baby boy.

In Syria, dictatorship is a family business, albeit less in the sense of a medium-sized company and more of the Mafia: Baschar's father was a dictator.

In order for him to succeed, the minimum age set in the constitution for a president was lowered to 34 years.

The Assads and Makhloufs (Baschar's maternal family) have divided Syria among themselves and filled important positions in the economy, the military and the secret service.

This family-run dictatorship has not run without drama to this day.

You could see that on the beef between Bashar and his cousin Rami Makhlouf (also called Rami al-Harami, Rami, the thief).

Congratulations and ritualized judgment

Back to Assad. Fifty years of dictatorship, torture and murder. Ten years of war and it's still there. A war that began with a call for freedom and human rights. Ten years of bombing cities and ten years of always saying someone has to stop it. Instead, Russia rushed to the rescue. The Assads are really indestructible, no revolution, no cancer (his wife and would-be Lady-Di) and certainly no Corona could stop them. So now the re-election, whereby one can hardly speak of an election, not even of election manipulation. Election manipulation is preventing people from entering polling stations, deliberately counting incorrectly and correcting the result here and there. What Assad was doing was more like a play in which everyone had to play their part.He of course the main role, everyone else the extras.

The stage design also had to be right, his picture hung in every polling station, just like everywhere else in Assad Syria.

The ballot boxes were set up and collected again.

The count could be seen on TV.

Then the result: an incredible 95.1 percent.

Gossip, gossip.

Who would have thought that.

Aftershow election party in the streets.

Putin sent congratulations, Rouhani from Iran and Lukashenko from Belarus.

Dictators congratulate a dictator on a successful fake election.

As always, ritualized condemnation came from the USA and Europe.

They really made an effort.

There were even two opposing candidates, nobody knew them, but before 2014 you could only tick Assad “Yes” or “No”, and to make the choice less difficult, some ballot papers were pre-filled.

There was only a joke against the degradation of the regime

This time, Assad even managed to get more votes than there are eligible voters, and still - very modestly - stayed at only 95.1 percent. His father had already indulged in 100 percent. But what's the point when it's

anyway

is. It is often said that these elections are just a spectacle for the West. But nobody, neither the West nor anyone else, seriously believes that the theater has anything to do with democracy in any way. Nonetheless, Assad lets people come to the polling stations. If need be, under duress. Just as the regime gave people the choice "Assad - or we burn the country down" back in 2011, this election theater is just another humiliation and submission ceremony. People shouldn't believe this lie. You should only repeat it until you no longer believe in anything. Like the people on the streets who had to shout “Assad for ever” on the marches for the regime. Like the people in the Syrian prisons who were tortured until they said there was no god but Bashar.

The Assad family was never particularly good at losing. Last year a museum was opened in memory of Bashar's brother Basil. There you can also remember his career as a show jumper. It is not mentioned that he had his "friend" Adnan Kassar jailed after he defeated him in a tournament. Kassar was imprisoned for 21 years. In Syria, there was only a joke against the daily degradation of the regime. My father told me one thing: Assad is hungry and tells his servant to bring me food. This one brings a chicken, a cow and a donkey. Assad asks the chicken why are you here. The chicken says I'll give you eggs. Assad asks the cow. The cow says I'll give you milk. Assad asks the donkey. The donkey says I'm like you, nobody knows why I'm here either.