CCAS

CHARAI: Morocco: Splits and burdens

Monday, July 28, 2008
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
COMMENTARY:

When, against a background of growing conservatism, notably religious Mohammed VI succeeded his father Hassan II as king of Morocco on July 23, 1999, he set his sights on democracy and modernity. Nine years later, it is worthy noting that this dichotomy between the old and the new still exists as the king breaks with the past.

It is a tangible fact that the scope of liberties is broader. There is practically no taboo and the level of public debate surprises all who knew Morocco 10 years ago, let alone the Morocco of the 1970s.

Moroccans, long deprived of free expression, now discuss everything. The king's powers, his decisions, his court are no longer off-limits. While such burgeoning is not without shortcomings, excesses and other negative reactions, it is fundamentally undeniable that Moroccan society has secured liberties that seldom prevail elsewhere in the Arab and Muslim world.

Strongly dominated in the Sunni arena by the Muslim Brotherhood, political Islam operates in the context of existing rules and institutions. Thus, in many places around the Arab world, and particularly in Morocco, Islamist parties often participate in elections, whenever allowed to do so. Far from having an exclusive religious tone, their discourse often reflects the social and political demands of the people disappointed in their leaders' inability to meet expectations.

Since the 1980s and the '90s, the discourse of political Islam has tremendously evolved, as has the approach, which became more pragmatic. Instead of promising immediate restoration of Shariah, the Koranic canon, the majority of Islamist parties insist on three core concepts: freedom, justice and development. Their vision is, however, unchanged on women. But their discourse is new, and it pays off. Without renouncing their religious slogans, they have aptly integrated their discourse with the theme of democracy and reforms.

In Morocco, reshaping the political landscape and the task of increasing the credibility of elected bodies are further complicated by an active Islamist minority in Morocco, the Justice and Development Party (Moderate Islamist), which uses the divisions within other political forces to make important political scores.

Hyper-spiritual Islamists use the conservative backdrop of Moroccan society to make full use of social issues, in particular focusing on promoting moral values following the May 16, 2003, Casablanca terrorist bombings that killed dozens.

The main political battle waged by this trend pertained to the status of women. They were able, with massive mobilization, to block "the women's integration plan," a series of measures put forth by the government to improve the lot of the country's females. Mindful of the stakes, the king created a commission, which the Moroccan elite - with old reflexes still very much alive - believed would serve to bury the project. The surprise that followed was equal to their skepticism: Not only did the king not bury the project, but he endowed the country with a pioneering Status of Women reform that goes against the current trend nurtured by acute retrograde Islamist undertones.

As Commander of the Faithful, Mohammed VI undertook a deep reform of religious life while promoting an open and tolerant Islam and fighting extremism. This endeavor was conducted to reorganize Moroccan Islam and preserve its overtures as well as to stem the most virulent form of Wahhabism that started to take root in the early '80s when Saudi Arabia and Morocco joined forces against Soviet communism in Afghanistan. Mohammed VI chose the option of modernity, a break with tradition that is assuredly critical.

On the delicate issue of human rights, as lives were lost, he acknowledged (which is difficult in developing countries) the responsibility of the state and created independent bodies to seek the truth, offered compensation to victims, and proposed a Moroccan approach to reconciliation.

During his nine years of reign, Mohammed VI has proved that his faith in democracy is sincere and that he is resolutely modern. This said, one should not overlook considering the structural issues affecting Morocco, such as the fragmentation of the political class, the absence of a modern middle class and the political mishaps of the previous decades.

The most serious threat that looms over Morocco's future remains the nation's alarming poverty that the king inherited. Often stark, poverty is the lot of millions of Moroccans. Entire segments of society, albeit regions, were left to fend for themselves. The country's social deficit in terms of housing, hospital beds and basic infrastructure is significant.

The solidarity system put in place by Mohammed VI is based on a partnership approach with civil society. The resources mobilized are considerable but obviously insufficient to bridge the gap, particularly as the population growth remains unchecked despite progress made in urban areas.

The Moroccan economy's growth rate averages 2 percent to 4 percent over five years, not enough to augur that social problems will be solved in the coming years. Budget receipts, burdened by debt service, are insufficient inasmuch as Morocco, to jump-start its development, committed to an ambitious infrastructure development program of roads and highways, ports, rural electrification and potable water projects for the countryside. These are projects whose effects will be felt in the intermediate and long term.

The situation is a source of concern as extremism, incivility and illiteracy flourish on these islands of poverty. The "Moroccan Model" will only serve if tangible results can be achieved on this front, and Morocco's success will only be possible if properly supported.

Clearly, Europe and the United States are concerned in many regards, first for security reasons (illegal immigration, drug trafficking and terrorism) and to make democracy viable on the southern flank of the Mediterranean.

The breaks from the past made by King Mohammed VI deserve to be sustained as a role model for the region.

Ahmed Charai is an editor and publisher in Casablanca, and a member of the board of trustees of the Foreign Policy Research Institute in Philadelphia and the international nongovernmental organization Search For Common Ground, in Washington, D.C.

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N. African Anti-Terror Efforts Too Harsh, Critics Say
by Peter Kenyon
NPR
Morning Edition, August 13, 2008 · When bomb blasts rocked Casablanca in the spring of 2003, killing 45 people, counterterrorism officials warned that al-Qaida was attempting to open a North African front in the war on terror.

More attacks followed, and Islamist groups in Algeria and Libya changed their names to reflect a new allegiance to al-Qaida.

Five years later, experts and officials say a North African wing of al-Qaida has largely failed to materialize, with groups serving mainly to send potential fighters to Iraq and Afghanistan. Most North African governments have contained or subdued their Islamist threats, but critics say they've done so by severely curtailing civil rights and democracy efforts.

Returning To Normal

On a busy morning in a Casablanca public market, musicians and sidewalk vendors squeeze between the market stalls as local shoppers and tourists stream by. In the years since the string of suicide bombings brought al-Qaida-style bloodshed to this city, life has regained its normal rhythms.

Morocco — once labeled Europe's biggest source of terrorism by a Spanish judge — has arrested hundreds of suspects and prevented radical Islamist groups from mounting a sustained terror campaign. Four suicide explosions last year caused few fatalities, killing the bombers and one policeman.

Analyst Mohammed Ben Hamou, head of the Moroccan center for strategic studies, says better intelligence and a large allocation of resources have helped the security services keep violence at a manageable level.

"I think that until now, they have success," Hamou says. "From time to time, the security service finds a small group here, and small group here. Let's say that's something we will live with for years — will not stop today."

From Casablanca to Tripoli, Islamist groups have embraced al-Qaida's ideology and tactics, with limited success.

The most active is the Algerian group Al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb. Experts note that the Algerian Islamists have more than a decade of experience trying to topple their government, and they've been able to absorb new recruits from around the region.

Crushing Islamic Movements

One reason those recruits are available is because other would-be al-Qaida branches in North Africa have been largely stifled.

In Tunisia, where President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali recently announced he will run for a fifth term, authorities have moved to crush all Islamic movements, both moderate and radical.

When two Austrian tourists were kidnapped in Tunisia earlier this year, it turned out that Algerian gunmen were responsible.

In Libya last fall, the Islamic Fighting Group, or FIG, announced that it, too, was aligning with al-Qaida. But the authoritarian regime of Moammar Gaddafi has ruthlessly stifled Islamist militants there.

Dia Rashwan, an Egyptian expert on Islamist movements, says recent reports that Libyan militants may renounce violence raises the question: What violence is there to renounce?

"No, there is no violence in Libya itself, you know?" Rashwan says. "The majority of Libyans are already outside — joining al-Qaida itself, the headquarters, or some of them already arrested or killed in Iraq as volunteers. Libya itself doesn't suffer from the Fighting Islamic Group."

No Sign Of Letting Up

Despite their successes, North African governments show no sign of easing their grip. Morocco's ambassador to the United States, Aziz Mekouar, told a Washington audience in June that the kingdom worries the Islamist cells are sending recruits to fight elsewhere and getting involved in a range of criminal activity:

"We think that this mix of terrorism, illegal migration, trafficking in persons, trafficking in drugs — it's becoming real dangerous," Mekouar said. "And the big danger is that the money of drugs and human trafficking will be poured into the terrorism movements."

But a number of analysts and officials argue that there is another challenge facing Morocco, one that is not getting much attention at this point.

While terrorist attacks are down in both number and severity, public protests over soaring prices and miserable living standards are on the rise.

Demonstrators range from college graduates demanding jobs in the capital, Rabat, to poor Moroccans rioting in towns from Sidi Ifni in the South, north to Sefrou.

The protests involve a variety of complaints, but many stem from the fact that the terrorist threat in 2003 prompted the authorities to halt King Mohammed VI's program of political reform. As a Western diplomatic source in Rabat said, "The much-vaunted process of Moroccan reform has taken a step back."

Professor Mohammed Dariff, of King Hassan II University in Mohammedia, says that in the shock of the 2003 bombings, Moroccans stayed quiet as the authorities cracked down on virtually all forms of dissent.

But five years later, confidence in the government is falling and the most recent riots in Sidi Ifni could spread.

"Morocco has a long history of violence," Dariff says at a busy Casablanca cafe. "We could mention the Casablanca riots in 1965 or in 1981 or the events in Fes in 1990. In our collective consciousness, there are many bad memories of demonstrations and general strikes."

Even with its reform program stalled in recent years, Morocco remains light-years ahead of Algeria, Tunisia or Libya. Western and regional analysts say that, in general, these governments have been right to make security a priority in the face of the al-Qaida threat. But they wonder if the resulting repression is sowing the seeds of future unrest that could prove every bit as destabilizing as a terror campaign.

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Uproar over loud prayer calls in Muslim Morocco
The Canadian Press

RABAT, Morocco — The muezzins' calls echo well before daybreak, summoning the Muslim faithful to daily prayers and reminding foreign tourists in the Moroccan capital how far they are from home.

But the rising decibel level is deepening fault lines between a government drive to modernize and a wave of rigorous political Islam.

Morocco, a country of 33 million people, gets more than seven million tourists a year, and there are worries that some may be put off by the five heavily amplified calls a day, each lasting five minutes, to "hasten to the prayer, hasten to the prayer."

Muslim purists counter that authorities are compromising religion to please westerners and the country's liberal elite.

The frictions are happening in a country that is considered moderate on matters of religion and is a U.S. ally at a time when there are fears that al-Qaida is establishing itself in North Africa.

Morocco has lately been shaken by two different cases in which the government, or wealthy westerners, have been accused of plotting to force down the volume on the muezzins who make the call to prayer.

Nouzha Skalli, the minister for family and social affairs, is accused of seeking legislation to lower the volume on muezzins in tourist zones. Newspapers have asked whether Skalli, a feminist and former Communist, is trying to curb Islam and impose secularism on Morocco's overwhelmingly Muslim society. Some hardline imams have cursed her during public sermons.

"It made huge waves, even a tsunami," Skalli said in an Associated Press interview.

She wouldn't say what exactly she had proposed, since it happened at a closed-door cabinet meeting, but denied suggesting a law to muzzle the muezzins and said her statements were taken out of context. "It was a complete manipulation," she said.

Skalli views her job of promoting women's rights as part of a wider struggle between two models of society: one of "modernity, equality and openness" versus "closing-off and backwardness." She suspects she was targeted "because I'm a woman and because I represent modernity."

Earlier this year Annie Laforet, a Frenchwoman, was blamed for the closure of a mosque next to the luxury guest house she runs in the old town, or medina, of picturesque Marrakech. The claim, which Laforet denied, caused outrage in the local press, and Laforet says she received death threats on Islamist websites.

Local authorities backed her denial and then reopened the mosque, from which the prayer call now blares every morning about 4:30 a.m., and then again an hour later. "It's a bit loud, but it's fine," Laforet said. "Tourists know it's part of living in the medina."

Still, Mohammed Darif, a Moroccan political scientist and expert on Islamism, says hardliners increasingly are depicting the tourist influx as a threat to Muslim values. The wealthy may support the government's pro-western and liberal values, he says, "But the Morocco of poverty, backward countryside and urban slums is increasingly averse to tourism and the internationalized elite."

He says some Moroccans complain of walled-off resorts that make them feel unwelcome. "It's discrimination by wealth, and tourism is highlighting the sore," he said.

Olivier Roy, French author of "Globalized Islam," says the tensions are a new phenomenon, and that the former French colony has "a history of cohabitation" in which western hippies of the 1960s and '70s were welcome visitors.

Roy says louder calls to prayer are a product of Salafism, a rigorous strain of Islam imported from Saudi Arabia. "Thirty years ago you could barely hear the muezzin," he said.

Also, he said, the audio technology used for prayer calls has improved, and imams are in competition to fill their mosques.

Islam is the state religion in Morocco and the king is the "Commander of the Believers." The state trains and appoints all imams, but tends to avoid dictating standards of public behaviour.

Criticizing any form of Islamic practice is difficult in the Arab world because no Muslim wants to stand accused of being irreligious, Roy said, but as conservatives have become more outspoken, so have moderates. For a cabinet minister to say anything critical of prayer calls "would have been unthinkable only 10 years ago," he said.

Miloud al-Atifi is an imam who doubles as the muezzin in his small mosque in Sale, a poor suburb of Rabat. He takes a benign view of the muezzin uproar.

"The prayer cleanses the soul; it's fundamental," he explained, but loudspeakers are simply a technical aid and can be toned down if, for instance, they're near a hospital.

They are helpful in competing with honking cars, he says, but nowadays believers can have the call piped in on their cellphones. He also notes that the Council of the Ulemas, Morocco's highest theological authority, has held that the pre-dawn prayer call should be a hushed one.

As for tourist zones, the imam doesn't think there's a debate because "If there are only non-Muslims around, it makes no sense to even have a call for prayer."

Text of call to prayer in Morocco's mosques

A translation of the Arabic-language prayer call heard five times a day in Morocco, an overwhelmingly Sunni Muslim nation:

God is great, God is great.

God is great, God is great.

I bear witness there is no divinity but God.

I bear witness there is no divinity but God.

I bear witness that Muhammad is the messenger of God.

I bear witness that Muhammad is the messenger of God.

Hasten to the prayer, hasten to the prayer.

Hasten to success, hasten to success.

God is great, God is great.

There is no divinity but God.

The first prayer call of the day adds: "Prayer is better than sleep, prayer is better than sleep."

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Also see Sam's "Morocco Pages" on his teaching website: http://www.wcboe.org/teachers/srichard/Morocco.htm

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Along the Portuguese Ramparts of Asilah Overlooking The Atlantic

The Scenic Tomb of Asilah's Marabout (Saint) Astride the Medina

Hitched Up and Ready for the Horsecart Ride to Paradise Beach

Lena, Zeina, and Arjunia on a Bluff Overlooking Paradise Beach

If it's the Yellow Parasol, it Must Be Harriet

Mariachis, Mole, and Morocco? You Bet. Mexico was the Focus Country of this Year's Asilah International Cultural Festival

Paula and Dallas Pass By One of the New Asilah Festival Murals for 2008

A Streetside Oud Musician in Asilah Plays for Sam

Mint Tea with a Strait of Gibraltar View: the old Beat hangout of Cafe Hafa

Jebli Women in Riffian Costume at the Tangier Market

Zeina Runs the Tangier Hawker Gauntlet...Thankfully, the Pitch Comes with More Humor ("He's from Oklahoma, he's from Michigan and I just got back from 42nd Street") and Idiom ("Come Check it Out")

Linda and Cherie Nutting, friend and photographer of the late author and Tangerine Paul Bowles

The Setting of our Farewell Dinner at Le Mirage

Sam, Ted, and Barbara Chase the Setting Sun at Le Mirage

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Brad Cools Off at Ras el Ma

Ted "Two Scoops" Eagles Near the Chaouen Kasbah

Chaouen Street Life

The Chefchaouen Medina Friom Above

Three Djellabas on Eerie Display

The Group Stumbles Upon a Kif (Cannabis) Field on a Rif Day Trip; Efforts to Encourage Alternative Crops Remain a Challenge

Jebli Family and Host of our Herbal Workshop and Goat Tajine Lunch

Alex with our Steady Driver, Mohamed, who became known as "Morocco Bronson" given his likeness to the American action film actor, Charles Bronson

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Tajine on the Terrace Overlooking Bab Boujeloud, a Landmark Medina Gate

Barbara Sinks Her Teeth Into A Most Tasty ("Zween") Camel Burger at Cafe Clock

A Post-Roundtable Photo with Moroccan High School Teachers and SACAL-Fez Representatives

Harriet Struts Her Pottery Stuff while a Moroccan Artisan Admires

Amidst the Elaborate Arabic Calligraphy at Medersa Bou Inania, Lena Discovers Her Name

Timeless Toil at the Tanneries

Dr. Fatima Amrani Discusses, with Gusto, the Progress of Feminism and Islamist Challenges in Morocco

Mohamed Bouziane, our Proud Guide, with the Fes Medina as Backdrop

A Zellij Artisan Measures a Tile for (Hand) Production

Exquisite Zellij at Medersa Bou Inania

Paula Peers Through the Palais Royal Gates--No Sign of King Mo VI

Sam and Lena: Saharan Style

Barbara and Paula with their Home-stay Mother

Hands of Henna

Paul and Harriet with their Home-stay Host (the Moroccan tunic was a parting gift)

Zeina Observes Her Home-stay Mother Adding Spices to a Tajine

The Best Rotisserie Chicken, No Doubt, in the Maghreb. A Lunch Road Stop in Ouezzane en route to Chefchaouen. The Owner and Succulent Twisting Birds Behind

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