News and info in Morocco

Since taking office, the Minister of Justice, Abdellatif Ouahbi has wanted to reform the judicial system in depth by also targeting the legal profession, whose rules of practice he wants to modify. This has earned him many disagreements with lawyers, exacerbated by the new tax regime provided for by the PLF 2023. The minister wants to relaunch the debate. This is why he sent a letter to the president of the Bar Association of Morocco, Abdelaouahed Al Ansari in which he invited him, Thursday, to a meeting at the “Club Nautique” in Salé.

In the letter, of which “L’Opinion” has a copy, Ouahbi specifies the purpose of the meeting by expressing his desire to discuss all issues relating to the profession of lawyer. A desire to strengthen cooperation between the supervisory ministry and the Bar Association, reads the text of the document.

Indeed, the new tax system should be at the heart of discussions knowing that the Casablanca Bar did not endorse the agreement sealed between the association and the government and which maintained the withholding tax with a reduction in tax rates. ‘taxation.

This meeting would be an opportunity to agree on the provisions of the agreement before it is sent to the House of Councilors where the discussion of the PLF continues. In addition to the tax system, the meeting should also focus on the bill relating to the exercise of the profession of lawyer which is not unanimous among black dresses.

It is an open secret that water is becoming increasingly scarce in Morocco. Indeed, the United Nations classifies the country in a situation of water stress. This observation is supported by an annual quantity of barely 500 cubic meters of fresh water per inhabitant. The most alarming thing is that this volume was 5 times greater in the 1960s. For its part, the World Bank refers to a situation of “structural water stress”.

Hydrologists, meanwhile, estimate that fifty cities are now under the threat of thirst, not to say dehydration, and that the rural world and the south of the country are particularly exposed to the worst.

Thus, everything is ready to deduce that at this rate, in 2050, Morocco could suffer a loss of more than 80% of its freshwater reserves, this vital commodity. Knowing this acutely, the members of the Moroccan League for Basic Education and the Fight against Illiteracy once again gathered at the headquarters of the Istiqlal Party in Rabat to recall the importance of repeating efforts to raise awareness about the rationalization of this precious liquid. “This awareness must encompass all possible audiences”, immediately launches the Secretary General of the League and teacher in higher education, Lahcen Madi, because “the time is no longer for reflection but for action” .

Still according to his cautious words, “this shortage and this state of affairs are likely to go from bad to worse if the wasters do not decide to break with their laxity in order to adopt good practices. Practices ranging from self-discipline, using water exclusively for vital needs, to raising awareness among those around them”.

This macabre scenario that awaits the Kingdom, according to connoisseurs, could be narrowly avoided or, if necessary, reduced to a minimum if the national educational body decides to dwell more on the question. “With associative actors from Salé, we wrote and started the performance of a few plays on the theme of water shortage and to tour the town’s primary, college and secondary schools. In addition, we hope that the other members of the league can replicate this experience in other cities of the Kingdom,” said an educational and cultural activist from Salé.

It didn’t take long for this meeting to turn into an outright brainstorming session. Thus, for two hours, representatives of all the cities of the Kingdom presented projects for educational campaigns, cinematographic, theatrical and even storyboarding of comic strips intended for toddlers.

“A few months ago, I was on the tramway in Rabat. A young man stood up and gave a speech worthy of a sage. He addressed all the users, thanks to his voice which carries with wish, while reminding them that we live an alarming water crisis and that all the citizens will have to reconsider their way of using this so invaluable resource. He explained, with intelligible language, that each glass, bucket, liter of water that we waste is a harmful gesture for our families, neighborhoods, cities, even for the whole country and that each drop of fresh water saved cannot to be wholesome and wholesome for all. Despite the unusual aspect of this initiative, very few people seem to have taken him for a madman. He moved us all and we even thanked him for his eco-friendly gesture,” says a member of Salé.

What the law says

In Morocco, water is a public good, it belongs to the entire national community. This principle of public water ownership was confirmed by Law 10-95 on Water, adopted unanimously by the Chamber of Representatives and published in the Official Bulletin on September 20, 1995. In terms of administrative law, its management is the direct responsibility of local authorities and other town councils.

Now the times are for draconian measures, fines and prison sentences. Proof of this is the recent hunt for water wasters, an operation launched in several Moroccan cities by local authorities to counter the misuse of vital liquid.

In Rabat, several car wash garages that excessively used drinking water as part of their activities had to stop their work this summer due to waste. Ditto in the nearby town of Salé, where a series of businesses that indulged in the practice of waste were subjected to a review of their water and electricity bills. Only companies consuming well water were able to slip through the fingers of the authorities.