Lhe data of the HCP does not suffer any shade. Physical violence costs more than all other forms of violence in Morocco. Its cost is estimated at 1.67 billion dirhams (MMDH) against 308 MDH for sexual violence.
The HCP explains that this amount stems from expenses incurred for health care (737 MDH), for recourse to legal and judicial services (406.8 MDH), and for accommodation in the event of abandonment of the marital home (293 .1 MDH), for the replacement and repair of damaged goods with 11.3% (185 MDH). Not to mention the indirect cost of domestic violence, which is estimated at 351 MDH. This is the taking charge of domestic work, paid work and/or the schooling of children.
As we can see, Moroccans are becoming more and more violent. Beyond urban violence and rampant crime that we have been witnessing for several years, with the proliferation of attacks, with or without weapons, beyond crimes related to the use and abuse of drugs of all kinds, beyond urban phenomena such as hooliganism, Ultras and latent gang wars, beyond sexual violence, rape, harassment and kidnapping, domestic violence, within the couple, within the family takes very alarming proportions.
The realities on the ground far exceed the figures put forward in these reports since many women never dare to speak about the violence they suffer and above all never file a complaint for many reasons: the weight of the family, the gaze of society , prejudice, precariousness and the lack of means to initiate legal proceedings against the aggressor.
Indeed, women often suffer in silence and gritted teeth: blows and injuries, assaults, rapes, kidnappings, kidnappings, moral harassment, stress and psychological and physical violence, attempted murder and assassinations. In this sense, it is also necessary to refer to the data put forward by the General Directorate of National Security (DGSN), responsible for processing cases of violence against women, which reveals that in 2021, 61,388 files relating to all forms of violence against women and girls were recorded, with a total of 62,383 victims, 7% of whom are minors.
Some believed that with the enactment in 2018 of a law that defines and criminalizes certain forms of violence against women, victims and their children could easily obtain justice. It was without taking into account the administrative red tape, certain laws of the penal code and other difficulties which make this desire for justice a pious wish, while violence is gaining ground in a frank way in a Moroccan society, in loss of values and in increasingly prey to violence at all levels. Faced with all these complications, it is easy to understand why many victims end up throwing in the towel.
Indeed, according to figures from the DGSN, 8% of abused women have no choice but to withdraw their complaints. They consider the procedures slow, long and discouraging. What makes say to several analysts that this heaviness has serious repercussions which one notes in the propagation of the cases of physical violence which is placed at the top of the table with 41% of the complaints. These are always accompanied by other types of violence: economic (27%), psychological violence (26%), sexual violence (4%) and violence via new technologies (2%).
When you combine it all, the cocktail that takes shape is frightening in a Morocco that constantly pleads for women’s rights, that advances many slogans for the protection of women and young girls, that speaks of equality and equity. …while the realities on the ground confirm increasingly blatant violent excesses that require a profound social debate.