Thirteen Years since Decree No. 66, Damascus Residents Still Feel the Ripple Effects

In September 2012, former President Bashar Al-Assad issued Legislative Decree No. 66 of 2012, which established two zoned real estate areas within the administrative boundaries of Damascus city. The first, known as Marota City, covers an area of 214 hectares and includes parts of the real estate areas of Mezzeh and Kafr Souseh; the second, known as Basilia City, covers 900 hectares and includes parts of the real estate areas of Mezzeh, Kafr Souseh, Qanawat Basateen, Darayya and Al-Qadam.

Under Decree No. 66, seven main committees were formed to carry out the core tasks of urban planning for the two zones. They were to manage all stages of the regulatory process, from surveying and valuing properties, to resolving disputes and distributing shares, and finally providing overall supervision. Those who owned a licensed residence became entitled to zoning shares in the area after its redevelopment. Owners of agricultural land on which unlicensed buildings had been constructed were entitled to alternative housing; owners of undeveloped agricultural land were to receive financial compensation; while owners of unlicensed houses were to receive temporary rental allowances and priority registration for alternative housing.

For those with rights in the two zoned areas, the redevelopment was not a process of upgrading informal settlements, but a profound disruption to their lives. Thousands lost their homes, were forcibly displaced, and suffered reduced rights and many injustices.

According to the Abolish Unjust Decree No. 66 Association, formed after the fall of the Assad regime, the Damascus governorate – responsible for implementing the two projects through the Decree No. 66 Implementation Directorate and Damascus Cham Holding Company – appropriated more than 83 per cent of the total area of each zoning area for infrastructure and investment plots it had expropriated. As a result, the original rights-holders were left with less than 17 percent of the original area of each zoning area. The association stated that the governorate demolished more than 12,000 housing units and displaced about 30,000 residents in the Marota zone, and demolished more than 20,000 housing units and displaced about 100,000 residents in Basilia.

After the fall of the Assad regime at the end of 2024, residents renewed their hopes of regaining their properties. But the new Damascus governorate circumvented its promises to compensate the rights-holders, “even at the expense of its own investment share,” according to Radwan Al-Ghafeer, the founder of the “Abolish Unjust Decree No. 66 Association.” 

Mr Al-Ghafeer told The Syria Report that the residents’ demands are clear: cancellation of Decree No. 66; prosecution of those responsible for its implementation; provision of free and immediate alternative housing for every displaced family; and redrafting the regulatory plans under a new and fair law that restores rights to their owners and respects the acquired rights of those who purchased and invested in good faith.

Two stories of forced displacement and lost

Ayman Futouh, a resident of Basateen Al-Razi (where Marota City is now located), had inherited a half-dunum plot from his grandfather and built a 150 square-metre house on it before Decree No. 66 came along. To him, the house was not merely an unlicensed building on agricultural land where construction was prohibited. “Building that house took 15 years; it was the labour of my lifetime,” he explained. He also bought an adjacent two-storey commercial shop of 47 square metres, which he used for selling computers and mobile phones.

In 2012, when Decree No. 66 was issued, the residents did not fully understand its dangers, according to Mr Futouh, and did not expect it to be implemented amid continuing insecurity and ongoing military operations around Damascus. Yet the governorate soon began implementation by gradually tightening restrictions on residents to force them to vacate, even before issuing eviction notices. The water and sanitation authority cut off the water supply to the area, forcing residents to rely on wells. “We lived like that for months without proper water, yet people clung to their homes,” he  explained. Later, the electricity company dismantled the main transformers supplying the area. “It was a clear message that life here had become impossible,” he added. Only in October 2016 did the governorate distribute eviction notices to the residents of Basateen Al-Razi, after a series of demolitions in Basateen Al-Mezzeh and Kafr Souseh. “The notice hit us like a thunderbolt, everyone knew it meant inevitable expulsion from our homes,” Mr Futouh said.

The governorate set March 2017 as the date for demolishing his house. But before that date, he received a call from neighbours telling him that the house had been demolished while his three children were still inside, causing multiple injuries that required their transfer to Al-Muwasat Hospital. His eldest son, then 12 years old, suffered a skull fracture and a serious brain injury, while his middle son sustained a compound leg fracture. “Those carrying out the demolition fled immediately, the bulldozer driver and the supervising engineer, leaving the children trapped under the rubble. The neighbours were the ones who rescued them,” he recalled.

While his eldest son was undergoing treatment, Mr Futouh received another call telling him that bulldozers had entered the street and demolished the shops, including his own, whose roof collapsed onto the stock inside, crushing the computers. “That’s how I lost everything,” he said.

Faced with the critical condition of his eldest son, he had to sell ten million of his shares, at the price of SYP 1.25 per share, out of a total of 24 million shares he owned. He had no time or opportunity to negotiate; he sold them at the door of the public hospital in order to transfer his son to a private hospital. There, the boy underwent a nine-hour surgery but was left paralysed and in need of long-term physiotherapy. “We began a treatment journey that exceeded 1,500 physiotherapy sessions. With every session, I felt I was paying the price of the house all over again,” he said.

Ayman decided to seek justice in court and filed a lawsuit against the supervising engineer, the Damascus governorate, and the Housing Establishment that oversaw the project. But he soon received direct threats from influential figures in the former regime – threats of arrest and security prosecution if he persisted. He then realised that the path to justice was entirely blocked and that the price would be his own life and his children’s future. He was forced to sell the remainder of his shares and spend the proceeds on his children’s ongoing treatment.

Today, Ayman Futouh and his family live in Germany, having been granted humanitarian asylum thanks to the medical reports on his children’s condition, the police records, and photographs of their injuries. Yet despite escaping physical danger, he still bears deep psychological scars that prevent him to this day from returning to the area or even seeing his demolished properties.

While Mr Futouh still receives an annual rental allowance of SYP 490,000 —an amount he describes as “symbolic and worthless today” – that sum was sufficient in 2016 to rent a house in Old Mezzeh, where another displaced resident, Mohammad Khalil Qadri, first moved. 

Mohammad had been forced to vacate his home on Al-Mustafa Street in Basateen Al-Razi in September 2015, in the first street in the area to face demolitions. “We ended up moving from one house to another, each further away, in worse condition, and at higher rent. From the moment of eviction, everything deteriorated—our home, our family, our community, even our dreams,” he said.

Mr Qadri describes what happened as a repeated sequence: “Notice, eviction, demolition.” But the intervals between each stage of the project kept getting longer, leaving people in years-long states of anticipation and constant anxiety. At each stage they faced new problems. Initially, they received the rental allowance annually; later, it was delayed, and its real value diminished as the lira depreciated, until it became worthless amid inflation. “The home I had built for my family among the orchards no longer exists. We found ourselves in smaller, lower-quality houses. Family problems increased. We were forcibly separated from relatives, neighbours, and our entire community,” he added.

With rising rents and living costs, residents began selling their shares at extremely low prices – SYP 1 or 1.5 per share. “I personally lost my money this way. I kept selling shares to cover rent and daily expenses,” Mr Qadri said.

“When we moved to the area in 2002, our dreams were rosy. We thought of expanding our home surrounded by orchards, but what happened after 2015 reversed everything. Instead of moving forward, we went backwards and lost everything,” he said.