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Two weeks ago,
Although attacks on independent journalism in Morocco escalated in 2009, reinforcing concerns a CPJ delegation conveyed three years ago in Rabat to his predecessor, Nabil Benabdallah, and former Prime Minister Driss Jettou, Communication Minister Khalid Naciri strongly denied that Morocco under King Mohamed VI was turning its back on what he called the “democratic process.”
“It is a myth to claim that the democratic
process is regressing,” Naciri told CPJ. “Press freedom is one of the
cornerstones of our policy and we have absolutely no intention of wandering
away from it. The enemies of press freedom in
Naciri went so far as to allege that “red lines”—the
unwritten rules on what kind of journalism is acceptable—have gradually vanished since Mohamed
VI ascended to the throne in 1999 and “all issues, including the king’s private
life and the country’s territorial integrity, are defiantly tackled on a daily
basis by journalists determined to settles scores” in a country where “most of
the 27 dailies have an editorial line opposed to the government.”
He did not sound convincing in response to findings
by local and international groups, including CPJ, that the judiciary was politicized
in order to imprison
weekly Al-Mishaal’s editor Driss
Chahtan for stories about the king’s health as well as close down his paper,
the independent daily Akhbar
el-Youm, and another weekly, Le
Journal Hebdomadaire. He denied that the crippling
damages imposed on three dailies found guilty of hurting the “dignity” of
Naciri acknowledged, however, that 2009 was a “difficult
year” for the press in
The CPJ delegation informed Naciri, who said
more than once that Morocco offered more room for freedom of expression than
most countries in the region, that Egyptian journalists, for instance, were not
jailed for writing in previous years far more critical stories about President Hosni
Mubarak’s health and Qaddafi’s autocratic rule.
But it was the case of Le Journal Hebdomadaire, a leading government critic silenced
earlier this year, and its former managing editor, Aboubakr Jamai, which
spurred the most anger from Naciri. “Jamai thinks he is above the law and can
get away with this by complaining to the U.S. State Department,” he said. He
forgets that failure to pay taxes is one of the most unacceptable abuses in a
democratic society.”
Unlike human rights lawyers and independent
journalists, he argued that the case filed against Le Journal Hebdomadaire, allegedly for failing to pay social
security and other debts, “was not politically motivated.” An independent
journalist told CPJ on condition of anonymity that Naciri’s anger with Jamai “simply
mirrored the angry reactions this highly competent, honest, and uncompromising journalist
has been prompting for years among King Mohamed VI’s top advisers who enjoy
more influence than any member of the government, including Prime Minister
Abbas Fassi.”
Jamai and Ali Amar, co-founder and former editor
of Le Journal Hebdomadaire and author
of a banned book on Mohamed VI’s 10-year rule took refuge in neighboring
Naciri’s aides took us by surprise when they
said Prime Minister Fassi was expecting to meet with us on February 18. “How could we go to such
an important meeting without being informed by Moroccan authorities?” asked Abdel
Dayem. When contacted on February 19
by CPJ, the prime minister’s office confirmed that it had awaited the CPJ
delegation on Thursday, without explaining, however, why no information was
conveyed to the members of the delegation or their colleagues in
The request to meet with the prime minister was
not the only one that went unrequited. Requests to meet with
Fassi never earned much of a reputation for
caring about independent journalism or being in any particular hurry to
implement a government promise made more than two years ago to submit to
parliament a less restrictive draft press law. Twenty six articles of the country’s
notorious 2002 Press Law call for prison penalties for journalistic activities
deemed offensive.
Independent newspapers didn’t cover CPJ’s
“missed meeting,” but they did cover the failure of authorities to officially
authorize a meeting between journalists and our delegation. That meeting was
slated to take place just hours after our meeting with the minister of communication.
“Local authorities in Casablanca shattered to pieces Communication Minister
Khalid Naciri’s allegation that it was a myth to claim that press freedom in
Morocco was backsliding,” said Akhbar
al-Youm al Maghrebia, which emerged from the ashes of the daily Akhbar al-Youm, closed down in September
for publishing a cartoon concerning a “strictly private wedding ceremony
organized by the royal family.”
Having been denied an opportunity to host a
roundtable to discuss the state of press freedom in
Equally disappointing was the failure of
officials at the Moroccan Embassy in
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