If you wish to believe that Syriatel will henceforth be owned by the poor of Syria, you can.
Mr. Makhlouf said that he would offer shares of Syriatel, Syria’s largest phone company, to the poor and that profits would go, in part, to families of people killed in the uprising. He said profits from his other endeavors would go to charitable and humanitarian work. He vowed not to enter into any new business that would bring him personal gain.
The move represented a humiliating moment for a man who is leery of the limelight, only rarely grants interviews and is described by detractors as the Assad family’s banker or Mr. Five Percent. The ascent of Mr. Makhlouf, at the intersection of power and privilege, mirrored the Assad family’s consolidation of power in Syria over the past four decades: his father Mohammed, Mr. Assad’s uncle, was a magnate in his own right, and Rami Makhlouf’s brother, Hafez, is the intelligence chief in Damascus.
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