This summer I did not return to “home”, as Moroccan emigrants living in Europe say, because I understood long ago that my little Morocco (that of my grandparents, the aunts who kissed me so hard it hurt, the deluge of cousins who gathered at the family home every summer) is within the great Morocco, the authoritarian dictatorship that has led the destiny of the Maghrebis since the country obtained independence. Independence from European colonizers, but not from another foreign domination –insofar as it is alien to the general interests of the population– such as that of the Alaouite regime, with Hassan II and now Mohamed VI (and God save us from the heir, Hassan III).
I will not set foot again in the country where I was born because it is not a safe place for anyone who defends human rights and freedom of expression or denounces the abuses committed by the makhzen. Not to mention Islam, untouchable even though the Prince of Believers, the king, whose power is legitimized by religious reasons (he is supposed to be a descendant of Muhammad), leads a lifestyle that is, let’s say, not very Muslim. The motto of Morocco, with which its national anthem ends, is: "Homeland! King! God!" (written in large letters on some barren mountains, as if it were “Hollywood”). And these three pillars are untouchable, and criticizing or mocking them can be grounds for a crime.
Last year Ignacio Cembrero explained the case of a housewife, a mother of four, sentenced to four years in prison for making a joke on Facebook after learning that the price of a gas cylinder was going up again. Her crime? Showing a 50-dirham banknote and saying: “Not even with three kings can I pay for a cylinder” (because on the 50-note there is the image of the last three kings of Morocco). The case of Bety Lachgar, sentenced to prison for wearing a t-shirt in London with the motto “Allah is lesbian”, demonstrates that the tentacles of Moroccan surveillance extend beyond its borders.
Tourists who enjoy the exoticism of Marrakech and the hospitality of the inhabitants of a country that is “so close and yet so far” (a hospitality they admire a lot but do not import) do not see or do not want to see how the kind and helpful indigenous people who serve them live. May the prisons packed with political dissidents or simple critics of power or corruption or the lack of rights and freedoms not spoil their weekend getaway. Journalists, social movement leaders, activists, anyone who dares to stand up to the regime or point out its corrupt functioning runs the risk of being prosecuted and imprisoned. The latest movement that challenged the power, the Hirak, born in the Rif, has a good part of its protagonists in prison, including the charismatic Nasser Zefzafi. In July, journalist Ali Lmrabet, who has spent decades in intense combat against the abuses of the Alawite dictatorship, was arrested when he set foot in Morocco, accused of various crimes, all related to expression. Three days later he was released but with the judicial case pending.
It is surprising, then, that the Spanish government states with conviction that Morocco has not been involved in the massive entry of people into Ceuta this summer. And it is a naivety (if we assume good faith) that is embarrassing, considering that before the technological era the country already had secret services capable of detecting the tiniest movement that occurred in any corner of its territory, that it has spied on foreign leaders with Pegasus, and that it has eyes and ears everywhere. And also considering that border control is a responsibility for which, furthermore, it receives substantial income from the European Union. Cuckolded and paying for the drinks, as we say in Catalan.
