Tomeh to Form the New Government Within a Month

Ahmad Tomeh, president-designate of the interim government, said that “I have begun contacting with those involved in the forming of the new government. I was given a month for this task and I will present the cabinet line-up for the vote of confidence during the first meeting to be held by the Syrian Coalition. The new cabinet will remain small and agile, and is much more like a government in a state of war in accordance with the situation we are going through. In light of our experience in the previous government, we are going to reshuffle the cabinet and merge some existing ministries while new ones will be added, most  notably the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. We also seek to attract more competent ministers and deputy of ministers in line with the recommendations of accounting and control committee and to enhance transparency in our work.” Tomeh acknowledged that “the responsibility is huge in the current circumstances as “regaining a stolen country is much harder than governing a stable one. Perhaps most significantly, we must work to reduce the dependence on the external resources.” Tomeh pointed out that “we have so far been unable to solve the problem of the official documents of the Syrians which remains an intractable and a growing problem as the Assad regime still has the exclusive right to issue these documents. However, we managed to organize the civil registry in the liberated areas over the past year.” (Source: Al Sharq al-Awsat)