Morocco Feature: Has the Arab Spring Come and Gone? (Daadaoui)

Casablanca, Morocco, 31 July 2011Mohamed Daadaoui writes for Muftah:

Several months after revolts toppled authoritarian regimes in Tunisia and Egypt, the Arab Middle East continues to undergo seismic changes. Between Syria’s crackdown and Libya’s quagmire, the Arab Spring seems stalled and the momentum for further regime change diffused. However, not all the region’s Arab regimes have used abject violence to stem the growing demands for socio-economic and political reforms. Relying on the popular appeal of its monarchy, Morocco has dealt with its protest movement through a calibrated political strategy of sheepish reforms, while also benefitting from the fledgling opposition movement’s lack of coherence and organization.

Constitutional Reforms

No sooner had protests erupted in Morocco than king Mohammed VI gave a major speech on constitutional reforms.  Unlike the violence used by some regional regimes to deal with such demonstrations, the Moroccan king’s March 9th speech pledged constitutional reforms and addressed the government’s regionalization process, a program launched last year to devolve power to the kingdom’s different regions. In his speech, the king promised “comprehensive political, economic, social and cultural reforms,” expressed his “firm commitment to giving a strong impetus to the dynamic and deep reforms taking place,” and employed strong pro-reform language. Notably, however, the king failed to mention the monarchy’s role in or the scope of these reforms.  This sent mixed signals to both the opposition forces and the reform movement – in the past, the kingdom has undergone top-down constitutional reforms that have only strengthened the monarchy’s control over the political system, drowned the party system with political parties loyal to the palace, and introduced electoral engineering. Still, after the king’s March 9th speech, many Moroccans remained hopeful that meaningful change would come to the kingdom’s socio-economic and political circumstances.

However, after the palace commission on constitutional reforms unveiled its recommendations for a new draft constitution on June 2011, this sense of hope dissipated. In a major speech, the king endorsed the commission’s draft constitution and introduced its newly-minted concepts of a “citizenship-based monarchy” and a “citizen king.” The new draft constitution was summarily submitted for a referendum in July and approved by a resounding 98% of the popular vote.

The new constitution provides for vast stylistic changes, but little in terms of deep institutional reforms. For example, the king is no longer sacred, although he still remains inviolable “and [] respect and reverence shall be due to him as king, commander of the faithful (amir al-mu’minin) and head of state.” All the new constitution has done, however, is to split the old constitutional provision on the king’s sanctity (article 19) into two new provisions (articles 43 and 44) that more specifically detail the monarch’s religious and political powers. In essence, then, the king retains the religious and temporal authority he had under the previous constitution.

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