Meson internals have nothing to do with cmake, and the syntax is not python. If you want to make that comparison, meson is more restrictive than cmake, but ten

Meson internals have nothing to do with cmake, and the syntax is not python. If you want to make that comparison, meson is more restrictive than cmake, but tends to have more functionality built-in to make up for it. bazel is more all-encompasing than either, as it's more about reproducible and distributed builds than a "better makefile" type system.