Upon the death of his father, it looked as if Morocco might be on its way toward total freedom of expression. This post is too short to go into much detail, but tentatively at first, then progressively with more and more confidence the media and the arts began to confront previously taboo subjects including corruption in government and the private sector, human rights abuses, gender oppression, linguistic and cultural suppression of minorities, policies in the Western Sahara, homosexual rights, etc.
There was shock when the Moroccan magazine TelQuel was able to publish an investigative piece on “The Salary of the King,” and get away with it. Under his father Hassan the II such matters were kept as secret as nuclear launch codes. I don’t mean to say that the media totally ignored all that was wrong in Morocco until the liberalization, either. But when something was reported, it was done very carefully, with great care as to who was bore the blame. All of that changed in the years following the elevation to the throne of Mohammed VI.
Recently, however, there have been a number of setbacks and it has been hard to watch. Continue reading
Tag Archives: “le Monde”
Le Monde Banned in Morocco because of an Opinion Poll
Cover of the seized edition of TelQuel
The August 4 issue of Le Monde was seized and blocked from distribution in Morocco because it republished a survey that was supposed to appear in the Moroccan magazines TelQuel, and ????? but which was censored in them, as well. 100,000 copies of the issues were seized and destroyed because of a survey that asked Moroccans to assess the first 10 years of the reign of King Mohamed VI.
L’édition du Monde daté mardi 4 août a été censurée au Maroc. La non-distribution du quotidien dans le royaume a été confirmée, mardi matin, par la société en charge de la distribution, la Sochepresse. Au cours du week-end, les autorités marocaines avaient informé celle-ci que Le Monde serait censuré dès lors qu’il publierait les résultats d’un sondage d’opinion sur le bilan des dix années de règne du roi Mohammed VI.
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It is disheartening to read such stories because for the first few years of Mohamed VI’s reign there was an incredible spirit of hopefulness. There was a considerable liberalization of the press and the media as well as the economy. It seemed that Morocco was moving quickly down the road to democracy. Ten years on, progress has stalled. This is a real setback.