Sharaa’s amnesty decree tests Syria’s constitutional order

The Ministry of Justice defends the decision as lawful and necessary. Justice Minister Mazhar al-Wais argues that while the Constitutional Declaration does not explicitly grant the president authority to issue a general amnesty, it does not expressly forbid it either. He points to provisions in the existing Syrian penal code and to constitutional customary practice that, in his view, allows the presidency to act when the legislature is inactive.

More broadly, al-Wais frames the issue as one of survival. Transitional governance cannot stall while waiting for incomplete institutions to mature. Overcrowded prisons and stalled courts demand immediate solutions. In this view, executive flexibility is not overreach, but a condition of maintaining order.

He has also invoked revolutionary legitimacy. Syria, he argues, is not yet in a normal constitutional moment where every action must fit neatly within peacetime procedure. The transition requires practical responses that prioritise public welfareover strict procedural formality.

Counter claim

Constitutional scholars and several members of the drafting committee see the issue differently. For them, revolutionary legitimacy ended with the adoption of the Constitutional Declaration in March 2025. From that moment forward, Syria entered a temporary but binding constitutional order. Authority became text-bound.

Once a formal framework exists, the logic of exception must yield to the logic of rules. A legislative vacuum, they argue, does not authorise the executive to assume powers it was not granted.

They also point to Article 41, which allows the president to adopt extraordinary measures in the event of a grave threat to state unity or institutional functioning. But this mechanism requires a formal declaration of a state of emergency. If properly invoked, it could provide a legal pathway for temporary legislative action. The amnesty decree, however, was not grounded in that framework.

For critics, that omission is telling. Even if the policy outcome is defensible, bypassing the prescribed constitutional mechanism undermines the very framework meant to guide the transition.

Transitional governments inevitably operate in grey zones. Institutions are fragile. Political pressures are intense. Some improvisation is unavoidable. But the legitimacy of a new political order depends less on its ability to improvise than on its willingness to bind itself to declared rules. If constitutional limits can be stretched whenever institutions lag, those limits gradually lose force.

Acute concern

This concern is especially acute in Syria, which is emerging from decades of concentrated executive power. Even narrowly tailored measures can generate unease if they appear to sidestep constitutional guardrails. In this context, procedure is not a technicality. It is part of the promise that the new order will differ from the old.

The question is not whether the amnesty will ease prison overcrowding or reduce tensions in the short term. It is whether it reinforces or dilutes the principle that political power must operate within clearly defined limits.

Necessity does not eliminate constitutional constraints. It tests them. The structural solution to Syria's legislative vacuum is not to stretch the constitutional text to meet immediate needs, but to accelerate the formation of a functioning legislative branch capable of addressing them. It also requires an active and independent Supreme Constitutional Court empowered to resolve disputes and maintain balance among the branches of government.

Transitional periods compress time. Decisions often must be made quickly. But speed does not relieve leaders of the obligation to anchor their actions within the constitutional framework they have endorsed.

The amnesty may ultimately prove to be an isolated response to institutional delay. Or it may establish a pattern in which constitutional limits are treated as negotiable. The difference will shape whether Syria's transition consolidates into rule-bound governance or drifts back toward executive predominance.