How Arab autocrats pick their opponents
Successful strongman seeks short-term partner with nice smile but limited ambition
CANDIDATES FOR president often need no introduction: a run for the top job is the capstone on a long, striving career in the public eye. Not so for Faten Ali Nahar, who seems to have found ambition late in life. On April 20th the speaker of Syria’s parliament announced that Ms Nahar had registered to stand in this month’s presidential election. Hardly anyone in Syria had heard of her. Searches on social media yielded little. A widely circulated photo of a woman said to be her also appears on a Facebook post about a Russian pharmacist who committed suicide in 2017.
This article appeared in the Middle East & Africa section of the print edition under the headline “How despots pick their opponents”
Middle East & Africa May 8th 2021
- Somaliland, an unrecognised state, is winning friends abroad
- Donors make it harder for Africans to avoid deadly wood smoke
- Covid-19 has exposed Africa’s dependence on vaccines from abroad
- Houthi rebels look to take Marib, prolonging Yemen’s war
- Foreign workers in Qatar get some basic rights
- How Arab autocrats pick their opponents
From the May 8th 2021 edition
Discover stories from this section and more in the list of contents
Explore the editionMore from Middle East & Africa
France’s bitter retreat from west Africa
The danger is a security void now opens up
Ahmed al-Sharaa declares himself president of Syria
But he has given no details of what kind of state he wants to build
The fall of Goma heralds more bloodshed in eastern Congo
Rwanda’s reckless invasion raises the risk of a wider war
Hamas talks a big game but is in chaos
Look beyond the latest bravado and brutality and it is bitterly split
Iran’s alarming nuclear dash will soon test Donald Trump
There is no plausible civilian use for the enhanced uranium Iran is producing
Syria’s new rulers say they are keen to integrate foreign fighters
Outsiders continue to see them as a threat