Morocco: Journalistic maturity needed

AHMED TAIBI

09/09/09

Every time a Moroccan newspaper or magazine is banned from publication, a journalist or an editor investigated by the government, freedom of speech advocates and international media, like El Pais and Le Monde, cry wolf. They refuse to look beyond the fact that the government is “harassing” journalists and “suppressing” freedom of the media. They mount a campaign decrying the actions of the government as if they were unjustifiable, as though unethical, biased journalistic reporting were a myth.

Zainab

AHMED TAIBI

09/01/09

I cannot imagine what the life of Zainab Shtet is like. And nor can you.

Photo: Al Massae

Her father, Mohammed, compelled by dire

"Touche pas à mon enfant" an association that helps abused children, and its president, Ms. Najat Anwar, took on the case of Zainab; they hired lawyers to defend her in court. Anyone willing to provide financial support to Zainab to contact the Association directly. read more

financial circumstances, placed her as maid for a pittance when she was barely ten. His excuse can never abrogate his responsibility in his daughter’s unspeakable ordeal. Her employer is an affluent family of five, a husband and his wife and their three sons, living in a large villa in the swanky Al-Wahda neighborhood, in the suburbs of Oujda. The husband is a judge, an arbiter of justice, a guardian of society’s moral compass. Zainab, who is eleven-years old today, was their servant, their beast of burden, their slave. And much like when Moroccan nobility owned slaves, the dignified judge and his family thought they had the right of life and death over her.

Ten Years Later …

AHMED TAIBI

08/08/09

An "Ideal Morocco" According to government spokesperson Ahmed T. B.  Every time I listen to Mr. Khalid Naciri, Morocco’s communication Minister and the government’s official spokesperson, justifying the Moroccan government’s use of anachronistic and undemocratic laws to ban TelQe

Like most Moroccans, I remember where I was when, on 23 July 1999 and after a thirty-eight-year reign, Hassan II died. The majority of adult Moroccans today grew up enwrapped by his exalted image and compensatory grandiose achievements which engorged the nation’s media; his pictures fluttered along city streets and took a prominent place on all administrative walls to enforce his omnipresence; in hushed tones and fear, Moroccans bruited about the disappearances, the killings, the torture, the mass graves, the Oufkir family, and Tazmamert. Hassan II was a king whose knack to sustain the loyalty of his subjects by intricately balancing violence and philanthropy was legendary. I couldn’t help thinking then that the following days were momentous for the Moroccan people.

Morocco and the independent Press

AHMED TAIBI

07/14/09

Over twenty independent Moroccan newspapers and magazines, in an unprecedented show of discontent, published blank editorials to protest the government’s legal campaign to silence them. Since the press law reform of 2002, Moroccan media have seen an increase in stiff criminal penalties and civil damages against journalists and the publications they write for. So stiff, in fact, that if a country’s wealth were to be gauged by the fines it imposes on its free media, Morocco would be considered one of the richest countries in the world. The punitive judicial sanctions were levied for what the Moroccan authorities perceived as libeling government officials, institutions, and foreign dignitaries, undermining the nation’s image by reporting on the criminal involvements of government representatives, insulting Islam’s tenets, and disrespecting the person of the king.

In Morocco, an Alternative to Democracy

AHMED TAIBI

07/05/09

The Washington Post published a highly embellished op-ed titled “In Morocco, an Alternative to Iran,” that you can – but you shouldn’t because it’s a waste of time – read here, by Anne Applebaum in which she exhibited Morocco as a progressive Islamic democracy where scantily clad women wouldn’t look out of place, people holding signs peacefully demonstrate before the parliament without harassment, and journalists criticize the government freely. She lauded Morocco’s human and civil rights improvements; she urged the readers to see Morocco as an alternative to Iran, a country where elections are fraudulent and voters are beaten and often killed by police. I sent an email to Mrs. Applebaum calling her op-ed hogwash. It reads like a statement from the Moroccan Ministry of Interior, or an English translation of an editorial from the Maghreb Arab Press. In fact, it amounts to nothing more than a tourist’s perspective on superficial political and social aspects the government flaunts before the West as symbols of Moroccan democracy.

Moroccan Elections

AHMED TAIBI

06/08/09

In an expression of deepening discontent and rising popular cynicism, a procession of dozens of Moroccans led by a nonchalant barebacked herd of donkeys walked, last Tuesday, the streets of Nador in northern Morocco to protest an upcoming communal elections fraught with broad-based fraud, violence, intimidation, and political manipulation at the highest levels of the government. The protestors shouted slogans and carried banners denouncing the unethical practice by the candidates and the parties they represent of buying votes with cash or in-kind services. It has been rumored that a vote goes for 500 MAD (56 USD) and will increase as election day nears. Some have sold their vote for nothing more than a loaf of bread and a cup of tea. The protest was meant as a parody of the democratic electoral process and governance in Morocco.

Mawazine 2009: Festival L’Fouda

AHMED TAIBI

05/25/09

An investigation has been initiated to determine the causes of the human maelstrom that left the stadium littered with shoes and tattered clothes

by EuroNews

and led to the dramatic death of eleven people and the injury of over forty others in Hay Nahda stadium in Rabat, Morocco. The tragedy struck when spectators attending the gratis Setati concert were exiting the stadium. The head shaking, sexdactyl Setati, being one of the most popular singers of Aita and cha’bi (Moroccan country music if you will) to come from ouled Hriz, drew, by official account, over seventy-thousand people to Hay Nahda stadium.

U.S. Report: Morocco’s Counterterrorism Strategy Positive

AHMED TAIBI

05/06/09

The U.S. Department of State lauded the government of Morocco in its annual report on terrorism published by the Office of the coordinator for terrorism. The strategic report, titled “Country Reports on Terrorism 2008,” was submitted to congress on April 30, 2009.

The Moroccan government made significant progress in the past few years and succeeded in reversing an emerging fundamentalist Islamist trend that was taking hold in the country. It demonstrated a very granular understanding of the asymmetric nature of the terrorist threat undermining the country’s national security. However, AQIM and its regional proxies, albeit decentralized and operating with reduced capabilities, remain highly symbiotic and capable of sensational attacks.

Our Health Minister

AHMED TAIBI

05/02/09

Have you ever walked into a room and could not remember why you walked in? I believe that is how Mrs. Yasmina Baddou spends her days at the Moroccan health ministry. Admittedly, the Moroccan health sector has been shoddy for decades. But a visit to Ibn Roshd, known as "Morizgo", in Casablanca, or any vermin infested public hospital - and private one for that matter - where destitute patients have to grease their palms to receive admittance into the premises and pay every step of the way to receive the medical attention the government ought to provide them for free, one gets a sobering sense of how declensional the state of our health care system is. Mrs.Baddou, whose judicial background hardly qualifies her to mend the budgetary and staffing ills of the Moroccan health care system initiated reforms that have been openly contested as ineffective by Moroccan health professionals. Her agenda has been criticized as being alienated from the health concerns of Moroccans.

When Apathy Kills

AHMED TAIBI

04/09/09

It was a rather nippy day for spring and pouring over this hamlet between Safi and Essaouira. The wet fields and the dirt roads were deserted and every now and then, a car or a truck zoomed by on the national route leaving a trail of muddy mist floating in the air. Travelers hardly stop here, Occasionally, a car would pull over just long enough for the driver to use the restrooms, drink some tea, and perhaps smoke a cigarette. A grand Taxis stopped in front of the only café in the area long enough for an old man to step out. The patrons looked at him through the glass door of the café with stolidity as he dragged his tired feet to a dry spot not far from the entrance and sat.

Countering The Iranian Threat

AHMED TAIBI

03/23/09

The recent political rift between Morocco and Iran was long overdue. Morocco ‘stand, far from being reactive, is deliberate and pragmatic. It was based on clear indicators as to Iran’s malign intent vis-à-vis Morocco. Unlike other Arab nations, especially Middle Eastern ones which, by virtue of their geographic proximity to Iran, are compelled to deal with it, Morocco can afford to forgo relations with the Islamic republic. This is not the first time the two countries have an axe to grind with each other; in 1981, Tehran ceased its diplomatic relations with Rabat for hosting the deposed Iranian shah. It took a decade for relations to thaw.

The Lingering Legacy Of Hassan II

AHMED TAIBI

03/18/09

When diluvial rains and heavy snows battered most of Morocco for weeks, the howling winds blew the cover on the fraudulent activities of government officials. Their nostrums dissolved transforming the already dreary and treacherous landscapes of rural Morocco into a death trap for many. While our politicians warmly spent quality time with their families in swanky homes surrounded by manicured front lawns and blossoming roses, Moroccans were treading water and trudging through mud to survive the collapse of their abodes.

Lurid Violence & Disturbing Message

AHMED TAIBI

02/16/09

At the behest of friends, I went to see “Taken” this weekend. The movie ranked second in the top box office list with a total of 20.3 million dollars. To me, that is a good indicator the American audience loved it.  I saw the trailers, but I was not expecting more than a mindless action movie.
I walked into the showroom holding my cup of a double Americano – which as I always do, snuck in. The place was packed. A couple of seats were spared at the two very front rows. I wasn’t gonna watch the movie with the tip of my nose touching the projection screen. Instead, I walked up the side stairs and sat on the red carpeted floor just as the movie started.

Killing Palestinian Civilians; Who is to Blame?

AHMED TAIBI

01/04/09

It is difficult today to find reports on the polarizing Palestinian/Israeli issue unladed of hyperbole; debating the conflict hardly ever occurs without damaging irrational emotional eruptions. It is analogous to navigating a minefield. Facts have been doctored; histories rewritten; irreparable mistakes of strategic heft made by not just the Palestinian and Israeli politicians, but the US and Arab governments as well. In the midst of this whirlpool of arguments and counterarguments, facts and fallacies, through the smoke screen of political folderol, there seems to be a consensus emerging: Palestinian civilians are being exterminated on a daily basis; their children and babies are dying from bombs, diseases, malnutrition, and forced illiteracy; their minds are being stuffed like a thanksgiving turkey with jaundiced ideologies; their despondent fathers are ripe for the picking by radical fringes and political dogmatists.

 

US Military, Law Enforcement and Constitutional Principles

AHMED TAIBI

12/23/08

Three to four million people are estimated to converge in Washington, D.C. on January 20^th, 2009 to witness the momentous inauguration of Barak Hussein Obama as the 44^th US president. Inauguration tickets, which are provided to members of the Senate and House of Representatives for free, are being snatched like hot dogs at a Nathan’s international July Fourth eating contest. Entertainment and sports event brokers are selling them for thousands of dollars. The swearing-in will last less than five minutes; people are willing to make their way on foot through closed-off roads and blocked bridges, around security barricades, in temperatures forecasted in the 30’s Fahrenheit, and stand for hours around the National Mall platform, west of the capitol to hear the words: I Barack Hussein Obama Do Solemnly Swear…