One Small Step for the Neomakhzen, One Giant Leap Backward for Morocco.
The PAM, or -ostentatiously- Party of Modernity and Authenticity has claimed victory on communal elections held in Morocco on Friday. Official figures seem to confirm that what was dubbed the King’s party has won a little over 20% of rural and urban council’s seats. This is a bunch of clueless, expedient opportunists, with no other ideology than that of monopolizing the power in a country they have deemed their personal property. Composed mainly of notables close to the central power, the party is led by Fouad Ali al Himma, former classmate of the King Muhammad VI at the Royal College and whose parliament group has recently pulled out from the government coalition, in a move widely interpreted as a royal attempt to form a political group of his own.
Unless one can’t read the obvious signs, this “victory” confirms, if any, what many have understood a long while ago: the Makhzen (the name given to the Moroccan economic, military and religious establishment) and the royal institution are not prepared to reliquished any of their feudal, totalitarian prerogatives.
All the mumbo jumbo about democratic transition in Morocco sounds with every passing day a little more absurd.
Welcome to Makhzen land.
Hisham Almiraat 