Morocco: A political system without accountability
Morocco: A political system without accountability
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By Democratic Way, Morocco. Originally published in Democratic Path #507. English translation provided by Justine S. for the Red Phoenix.
Translator’s note: This article was produced by our comrades in Democratic Way (the Moroccan organization of the ICMLPO) concerning recent protests organized by the Moroccan Social Front (Le Front Sociál Marocain), of which Democratic Way is a part. The article deals primarily with the political situation which has caused the problems being protested, but omits elaboration on the actual problems themselves. The main problem is the rapidly increasing cost of living, especially of food, which the capitalist system fails to distribute properly in the thick of a drought, and which is instead sacrificed to profit. Foodstuffs are sold for export, no price caps are introduced, and no extra taxes are levied on the capitalist class for the purpose of introducing more food into the market and lowering the price. The control of capitalists in government, especially of old-money capitalists maintaining connections and capital from the French colonial period, is much less obscured even than in the US.
The legislative branch of the Moroccan government is elected directly, while the executive branch is appointed by the king in the wake of elections, supposedly in correspondence with the leading force in the legislative branch. The current government, led by Prime Minister (also referred to as president) Aziz Akhannouch, is a coalition government between various liberal parties. Aziz Akhannouch is a capitalist, CEO of the Akwa group which grosses 3 billion dollars annually.
Chakib Benmoussa is a prominent Capitalist and politician in Akhannouch government with business connections to King Mohammad IV, descended from the old Grand Wazir of Morocco Ba Ahmed, who was a key servant of the French empire in the late 18th century.
The Moroccan Nationalist Movement was a national liberation struggle throughout the 1920s and 30s that sought political independence from France. The “reforms” referred to in the article are the Plan of Reform presented to the French colonial government by the National Action Bloc, most of whose members went on to found the Istiqlal party which led the bourgeois national liberation struggle in Morocco, and which now plays a leading role in Aziz Akhannouch’s coalition government.
Makhzen refers to executive branch, that is to say, the monarchical elements of the government, which retain a feudal class character, rather than a purely capitalistic one. The Makhzen has been used to refer to the government throughout Moroccan history, from the times of the Islamic Empire through the French Empire and up to the imperialist stage of capitalism today, and has implications of backwardsness nowadays.
The opposition refers to various social-democratic and “anti-imperialist” parties in the Moroccan parliament.
From the specific political situation in our country the voice of popular protest arises over the worsening conditions, and over appeals made by the parties in power concerning its government and the direction of its institutions to solve these problems. But to no avail, for if they do send out replies, these parties argue that they do not command the actual power necessary to treat the problem being protested. They say that they “are only following orders.” The government acts this way in all of its offices right up to the president, who shirks his responsibility off onto his president, i.e. onto the king or monarchy. But in the previous administration the president openly declared that any official not wishing to bear his actual responsibility should throw away his keys and go on his way.
So we stand before a political system in which you do not know which parties bear their responsibilities, and which need to be held accountable. And this confirms it: even though the parties ran on promises to realize a variety of aims in their political campaigns, once the electoral campaigns had finished and the government was settled, these parties immediately started implementing agendas completely unrelated to their platform or electoral campaign! God forbid the officials of government be anything less than friends of His Majesty and implementers of his will! This is in fact the condition of Mr. Aziz Akhanouch’s government, which implements that which is settled in Benmoussa’s committee, who dictate the “New Development Model.”
This is the state of the parliamentary majority, which eagerly accepted that it will become a bloc of senior officials which implements the orders emanating from the king’s chambers. And what is the status of the opposition in parliament? Here also we find among its leaders those who claim that they are the opposite of His Majesty’s clique, by which they mean that they defend his orders and implement everything His Majesty’s government requires of them, and gladly! Only when they feel that His Majesty’s government harms them do they battle it and attempt to overthrow it on the grounds that the majority of people in this country oppose the monarchy. We are looking at parties fighting each other to become more kingly than the king!
Is this condition, in which the current system wallows, an expression of a flaw in the method of government; is it possible to reform it with the correction of its practices or adjusting what is broken? This is precisely what was believed by some parties (i.e. the Istiqlal Party –Ed.) which formed the Moroccan Nationalist Movement, which were able to engage in reformist political work across sympathies in the government. But the result is this situation familiar to us today – the parties became Makhzen-like political entities who furnish the political scene, and offers its services to despotism, secures its fortress, until it cannot be reached by accountability or questioning.
The intention of generalizing this surreal scene is to confuse the people. It is not able to identify those actually responsible for its dire situation, which augments misery year after year, decade after decade.
The role of the actual opposition in our country is to expose all of these traps and uncover those who set and planned them. So it is necessary for the actual opposition of our country to expose all of the political, trade-unionist, and pluralist powers which allow the cover-up, otherwise we commit the same acts in service of the enemies of our own people. The role of the actual opposition is to struggle to reveal those actually responsible for the conditions of the majority and demand accountability. But this will not be possible as long as our country is subjected to the authority of a handful of comprador bourgeoisie, old landlords, and the hegemony of a mafia which appropriates the riches of Morocco, and which takes advantage of political and economic influence, as well as foreign political protection. The actual opposition will not be victorious in its battle if it has not engaged in popular struggle based on class and the targeted socialist parties, and on the vanguard of the working class, that which rises to realize the task of liberation of the nation, and the building of a people’s democratic state working to build socialism.
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