Morocco loses a beacon of freedom

[Al-khiyal]

Morocco loses a beacon of freedom

by Issandr El Amrani

January 30, 2010 -- About six or seven years ago, I began returning regularly to my birthplace of Morocco, a country I left as a child in 1989. The Morocco of my childhood was an isolated, quasi-feudal dictatorship in which the regime of the late King Hassan II brooked no dissent. During the 1990s, in the face of global changes after the fall of the Soviet Union and a greater concern for human rights among the governments and publics of Morocco's western allies, King Hassan began a slow transformation of his ossified regime. By the time he died in 1999, he handed over to his son a political system that had the long-shunned opposition in government, a much-improved human rights record, clearer economic governance and one of the freest press in the Arab world. I had missed out on all these developments, and was astounded at the difference a little over a decade had made. For a while, like many Moroccans, I was optimistic that the new king, Muhammad VI, would continue his father's reform process. The early years of his reign seemed to bear this out, with landmark reforms of human rights, the region's only truth and reconciliation commission over past human rights abuses, and a focus on addressing poverty that earned him the monicker "king of the poor".

However, it was Le Journal Hebdomadaire, an irreverent and audacious magazine, that seemed to me – perhaps because I was editing a like-minded publication in Egypt at the time – to most embody the changes that had taken place. Le Journal gave me hope that the new Morocco was real, and that the new king would allow a gradual and peaceful transition to democracy. Last Thursday, I learned from the man behind Le Journal, Abou Bakr Jamai, that bailiffs had come to the magazine's office, just as its journalists were putting the final touches on a new issue, to seize its assets. A series of crippling libel fines and debts to the tax authorities had driven it to bankruptcy. "We can already officially announce the death of Le Journal," Jamai told me. I was shaken to learn that no more issues of Le Journal would appear, although not surprised. It had become clear for several years that the palace – whether the king himself or his coterie of advisers – had given up on trying to co-opt or intimidate the magazine, as it has done with many other publications, and would sooner or later succeed in pushing it into oblivion by economic means.

Le Journal first hit the newsstands in 1997 and very quickly became one of the most daring publications in the country. It issued an early attack on Driss Basri, the all-powerful interior minister who for 20 years controlled Morocco through a web of informants and ruthless security forces. Attacks on Basri became commonplace after the new king dismissed him, but at the time it was considered suicidal. This was one of many taboos that Le Journal blasted away. It uncovered and publicised human rights abuses, taking the regime to task on its claims that it had broken with its bad old ways. It provided a detailed and continuous critique of the "hostile takeover" the new king's advisers were making on the private sector, bullying their way into unnatural monopolies and dampening entrepreneurial spirit. On the Western Sahara conflict, Le Journal pleaded that the best argument for Morocco would be respect for Saharawi human rights and a genuine democracy. It was socially progressive, but politically smart and conscious of Morocco's conservative traditions, avoiding the facile Islamist-bashing of the Francophone elite.

Most of all, Le Journal tried to keep officials honest about the democratisation that they promised in speeches. It relentlessly campaigned for constitutional reform that would shift political power from the palace to parliament. For many of my generation of Moroccans, it provided a political education and an inspiring example of outspokenness. The government could not simply close down a magazine, particularly one renowned at home and abroad as one of the symbols of a "Morocco on the move". Instead, it chose to suffocate it. Over the past decade, Le Journal has had numerous issues banned and faced a campaign to label its journalists as irresponsible "nihilists". Security chiefs have manipulated Islamists against it, and it has suffered countless other indignities. Most important, though, were two weapons. First, an advertising boycott that deprived the once-profitable magazine of revenues, not only from state-controlled firms and those owned by the royal family, but also from private advertisers who were warned the palace would look adversely at any support for Le Journal, even though it was one of the best-selling publications in its category.

The second weapon was the use of Morocco's crooked judicial system to obtain the largest libel fines ever imposed in the history of the Moroccan press. By 2007, after a long confrontation with the judicial system and the regime, Jamai decided on self-imposed exile to protect Le Journal, which continued without him for two years. While this bought some temporary breathing room, his return as an editorialist in 2009 appears to have sealed the magazine's fate: by September last year, a final verdict from the highest court in the land found against Le Journal. It has been living on borrowed time ever since. The most worrying thing is that its closure comes amid other signs of a renewed authoritarianism. The methods originally used against Le Journal have become a commonplace method of disciplining the press. Other critics of the monarchy, for instance in Morocco's vibrant blogosphere, are now dealt with severely. Political reform has hit a standstill, and the regime's human rights record has regressed. Le Journal's sad demise is now only one of many signals that something is rotten in the kingdom of Morocco.

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This is sad news. This journal even made it to newstands abroad once in a while.

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Pioneer of independent press in Morocco silenced

CASABLANCA, February 8, 2010 (MENASSAT) -- On Wednesday January 27, Hicham Bennani (30) was putting the final touches on an article for the next edition of Le Journal Hebdomadaire, the French-language Moroccan weekly newspaper that is considered the pioneer of the independent press in Morocco. The article was going to be about the rapid rise of the Parti Authenticité et Modernité (PAM), also known as the "Parti de l'Ami du Roi" (the party of the king's friend.) "But I had like a premonition that I was working for nothing," Bennani said. His premonition proved correct: that evening, as the paper was being put to bed, the bailiffs entered the offices of Le Journal in Casablanca. "At first they just served us with the court's decision," said another journalist, Omar Radi (23). "But 15 minutes later they returned with a locksmith in tow. That's when we knew the end had come." One week later a hall at the Socialist Party's headquarters in Casablanca was flooded with journalists. They were former employees of the Journal, but also journalists from other media who came to show their support and to listen to the last words of Aboubakr Jamaï (42), the charismatic founder of Le Journal. "Today I inform you that I am quitting the business of journalism in Morocco," Jamaï told the crowd. "I am not giving up my ideals, but it has become clear to me that serious journalism has become impossible in Morocco today."

Le Journal saw the light in 1997, at the end of the reign of King Hassan II. It shocked right away by publishing an interview with Malika Oufkir, the daughter of General Mohamed Oufkir, who was executed after a failed coup attempt in 1972. Ironically it was after the current King Mohammed VI ascended to the throne in 1999, and a wind of change blew through Morocco, that Le Journal's problems began in earnest. In 2000, the magazine was censored following an interview with Mohamed Abdelaziz, the leader of the Polisario Front, the movement fighting for independence of the Western Sahara. Shortly afterwards Le Journal was shut down after it ran an article about the involvement of the socialists (who had since joined the government) in the 1972 coup. Le Journal returned in 2001 as Le Journal Hebdomadaire, but after a successful first issue its ad revenue virtually evaporated overnight. According to Jamaï, the royal palace put pressure on the country's business community to boycott Le Journal. "An act of state terrorism," Jamaï called it last Wednesday.

Officially the closing of the Journal is due to a towering debt: 1.3 million euros in unpaid taxes and social contributions, and a 270,000 euros fine for libel to Claude Moniquet, director of the European Strategic Intelligence and Security Center, a Brussels think-tank. Le Journal had qualified a 2006 report by Moniquet on the Polisario Front as "tele-guided by the royal palace". Moniquet successfully sued Le Journal, leading Jamaï to resign and take up a position as a university professor in San Diego, California. When Jamaï agreed to return to Morocco in the spring of 2009, Le Journal was burdened by debt. "There was no ill will on our part," he said, "but after paying the printers and the staff there was simply no money left to pay taxes and social contributions." Jamaï and others expressed surprise at the unusual speed with which the Moroccan courts suddenly acted on the paper's legal problems, culminating in the media group behind Le Journal being declared bankrupt.

"There were many other ways to deal with the situation, said Ahmed Benchemsi, director of TelQuel, another independent magazine. "Le Journal was silenced for political reasons." Benchemsi has no difficulty admitting that his main competitor was the "pioneer" of the independent press in Morocco. "Le Journal was the first to push the 'red lines,'" he said. "It paved the way for all the others. In recent years it was no longer the market leader, but the symbolic importance of the Journal is undeniable. Its closure is just the latest sign of the deterioration of the media environment in Morocco." TelQuel itself was seized last year after it published an opinion poll about the popularity of King Mohammed VI – even though the results were overwhelmingly favorable to the King. Also last year Driss Chahtane, editor of the weekly al-Mish'al, was sentenced to one year in prison for spreading "false information" about the King's health. These are just a few examples of what Human Rights Watch last month described as a "deterioration of press freedom" in Morocco in 2009, although the human rights group also said the country still enjoys "a lively independent press." As to the why of this deterioration, Moroccan journalists can only speculate. "In Morocco, all decisions are taken by the king and a small circle of confidants around him. It is anybody's guess what the thinking is inside this small circle," said Benchemsi. "Perhaps they are feeling more confident now and it doesn't bother them so much to be accused of violating human rights."

For Hicham Bennani, who has created a Facebook support page for Le Journal, the closure is a tough blow. "Working for Le Journal was always more than a job. When I was still studying in Paris, Le Journal made me dream. It helped me to get to know my country, and it taught me to look at my country with a critical mind," he said. Although Bennani readily admitted that "Morocco is not Iran, or even Algeria," there is a feeling that a period of relative openness has come to an end in Morocco. "I don't see anyone starting a new Le Journal anytime soon." That may be premature. One of those present at Wednesday's meeting was Ali Lmrabet, a former chief editor of Le Journal. Lmrabet (50) served jail time for slandering the King, and in 2005 was banned from working as a journalist in Morocco for ten years. Since then he has been writing for the Spanish newspaper El Mundo. Lmrabet is back in Morocco now and he is toying with the idea of starting a new paper. "It is more necessary than ever," he said.

[Al-khiyal]

Maroc :
Un quotidien cesse de paraître provisoirement

Jeudi 6 Mai 2010 -- Le quotidien arabophone Al Jarida Al Oula (indépendant) a annoncé qu'il avait cessé provisoirement de paraître à partir de mercredi "pour des raisons essentiellement financières". Le journal a "cessé de paraître pour des raison essentiellement financières" en espérant "réappraître une fois ces difficultés dépassées", a indiqué un communiqué sans autres précisions. Créé en 2008 et dirigé par Ali Anouzla, Al Jarida Al Oula fait face depuis plusieurs mois à des "difficultés financières en raison notamment de non paiement de dettes à l'imprimerie", selon l'un de ses journalistes. "Nous nous excusons auprès des lecteurs pour cette absence forcée et espérons un retour très prochainement", a conclu le communiqué d'Al Jarida Al Oula. Le 28 janvier, les locaux du Journal hebdomadaire (indépendant) ont été mis sous scellé après une décision d'un tribunal marocain pour "non paiement de dettes".

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