Voter mistrust, fears of low turnout threaten Moroccan elections

Moroccan authorities should stop harassing people campaigning for a boycott of parliamentary elections this week, Human Rights Watch said on Wednesday.

The New-York based organization said Moroccan police had brought in more than 100 people for questioning about the distribution of pro-boycott leaflets or other efforts to urge voters not to cast a ballot on Friday.

“The rate of voter participation will be closely watched because it is seen as a gauge of public enthusiasm for the reforms that King Mohammed VI initiated during 2011,” Human Rights Watch said in an emailed statement.

“Some groups have urged a voter boycott, saying that the palace-led reforms do not go far enough to enhance the separation of powers and curb royal prerogatives.

“Harassing people who support a boycott is just as bad as harassing those who support a particular party or candidate, and casts a shadow over the vote,” it added.

King Mohammed backed constitutional changes and brought the vote forward by 10 months as part of a plan by the palace to bring fresh faces into a government associated in the minds of many Moroccans with corruption.

But the pro-boycott camp, led by a group called the February 20 Movement, said the vote just promises more of the same.

The official MAP news agency on Monday denied that the police had arrested anyone for leading the boycott campaign after newspaper reports of several arrests linked to the boycott campaign.

“Summoning scores of boycott activists in cities around the country to police stations for questioning amounts to a state policy of harassment - whether or not they are formally arrested and eventually charged,” Human Rights Watch said.

A law governing the Moroccan parliament reserves punishments of one month to one year in prison and a fine of $1,200 to $6,000 for “anyone who attempts, through the use of false information, false rumors, or any other fraudulent means, to change the vote of voters, or to push one or more voters to refrain from voting.”

Human Rights Watch considered that law, which was implemented in October, to be incompatible with “strong affirmations of human rights, including freedom of expression” under the new constitution adopted in July 2011.

No elections’ ambience in Morocco?

There are few signs here that elections are even taking place in Morocco.

Posters and raucous rallies for candidates are absent in the cities and instead there are just stark official banners urging citizens to “do their national duty” and “participate in the change the country is undergoing.”

“The parties have presented the same people for the past 30 years, the least they could do is change their candidates,” said Hassan Rafiq, a vegetable vendor in the capital Rabat, who said he didn't plan to vote.

Like elsewhere in the Arab world, Moroccans hit the streets in the first half of 2011 calling for more democracy, and King Mohammed VI responded by amending the constitution and bringing forward elections.

But since then the sense of change has dissipated.

The real challenge for these polls, in which an opposition Islamist party and a pro-palace coalition are expected to do well, will be if many people come out to vote in the face of a strident boycott campaign by democracy campaigners.

It’s a sharp contrast to the electric atmosphere that characterized Tunisia’s first free elections just last month.

“Moroccans feel that aside from the constitutional reform, nothing has really changed, meaning that the elections of 2011 will be a copy of the elections 2007 and that is what will probably keep the participation low,” said Abdellah Baha, deputy secretary general of the Islamist Justice and Development Party.

The 2007 elections, the first with widespread international observation, had just 37 percent turnout, and some fear it could be even lower this time around.

A close U.S. ally and popular destination for European sunseekers, Morocco with its many political parties and regular elections was once the bright star in a region of dictatorships.

But all that has changed with the Arab uprisings that toppled dictators in Tunisia, Libya and Egypt. Now a political system that holds elections but leaves all powers in the hands of a hereditary king does not look so liberal.

“Morocco can no longer say it is the only one with pluralism or that it has the ‘most,’ (pluralistic),” said Jeffrey England, of the National Democratic Institute, a U.S.-based organization dedicated to furthering democracy.

Yet the Arab Spring has not left the country untouched, and Moroccans today do expect greater freedoms and reform. “Even if the system structure hasn’t changed much, it has certainly changed the population’s perceptions and expectations,” said England, the institute's resident director in Morocco.

Moroccans feel that aside from the constitutional reform, nothing has really changed, meaning that the elections of 2011 will be a copy of the elections 2007 and that is what will probably keep the participation low

Abdellah Baha, deputy secretary general of the Islamist Justice and Development Party

Islamists party leading?

Meanwhile, Foreign Minister Taieb Fassi-Fihri dismissed any threat deriving from an Islamist party possibly leading the government.

“The parties will have to come together in coalitions, in fact some are already doing so, so I don't think there is much risk,” he told French news channel France 24. “On the contrary, we have continuity with a change of face.”

Moroccan political analyst Matti Monjib explained that the king “wants a government that doesn’t govern too much,” which could be a problem if any new coalition really tries to change things in the kingdom, such as the PJD’s promised anti-corruption drive - which might even target palace cronies.

Even with activists agitating against the vote and a middle class disillusioned with the process, Morocco’s traditional voting machine will still be functioning on Friday.

In rural areas, notables will gather up peasants and bring them to polling stations and instruct them whom to vote for, while in the slums around the big cities, local power brokers will deliver the votes of the poor.

The traditional voting system could also buoy a coalition of eight pro-palace parties that could form the next government and ensure the king has a friendly prime minister carrying out his wishes.