SCC Announces Court Ready to Accept Presidential Candidacy Applications
DAMASCUS, (ST)-President of the Higher Constitutional Court (SCC) Adnan Zreik on Tuesday announced that “starting from today morning the court is ready to receive applications for candidacy for the post of President of the Syrian Arab Republic.” The deadline set for accepting applications is May 1st.
Speaker of People’s Assembly (PA) Mohammad Jihad al-Lahham in a PA session yesterday announced that the door was opened for Presidential hopefuls to submit for candidacy in implementation of the rules of the new constitution approved by the Syrian people in a general referendum in 2012.
According to article 30 of the General Elections Law No.5, “a candidate for the post of the President of the Syrian Arab Republic should at least be 40 years old with a Syrian Arab nationality since birth and should have Syrian parents. The candidate should also be among people who enjoy all their civil and political rights and who haven’t been convicted before. He should be unmarried to a foreigner and be resident in Syria for at least ten consecutive years when he applies for candidacy. He should be eligible to vote and shouldn’t have any other nationality other than the nationality of the Syrian Arab Republic.”
Article No. 34 of the law says that the SCC supervises presidential elections. An application is not accepted by the SCC unless the candidate gets the support of at least 35 members of the People’s Assembly. Any of the above mentioned MPs are not allowed to support more than a candidate.
The SCC studies applications and decides which applications are accepted and then announced the names of the candidates within five day after the end of the deadline set for accepting applications.
Presidential Elections were set for May 28th, 2014 for the Syrians abroad and for June 3rd, 2014 for the Syrians residents in the country.
H. Mustafa