Morocco’s Istiqlal party wins most seats in Parliament
09/09/2007
Provisional results of the Morocco's legislative elections released Saturday (September 8th) indicate the conservative Istiqlal party, having won 52 seats, will be the most represented party in the 325-seat legislative body. Despite expectations of landslide victory for Islamist parties, the Justice and Development party (PJD) took only 47 seats and the Popular Movement (MP) only 43 seats. The National Rally of Independents (RNI) and the Socialist Union of Popular Forces (USFP) took 38 and 36 seats, respectively.
Estimations on Friday night that voter participation totalled 41% were later adjusted and Interior Minister announced on Saturday evening that overall turnout reached approximately 37%. Initial reports from international observers led by Bolivian President Jorge Fernando Quiroga Ramirez noted that with the exception of isolated irregularities, the elections were conducted with "strict transparency and professionalism".
Mohamed EL BAKI Posted 2007-09-09
What a surprise! The Istiqlal Party, one of Morocco's oldest, came out ahead in the elections. The true victor, however, was the abstainers... Thus a majority of citizens who no longer have trust in their political parties or elected officials! What a shame... it's too bad; in my opinion we should have turned out to vote en masse, to "stomp on the anthill"...
ابن الصلاح المغربي Posted 2007-09-10
Even if the Istiqlal party has won the first rank, but statistically, and on the basis of the numbers of votes, the PJD party is the first political power in Morocco. Secondly, there are many factors which contributed to the failure of the PJD in matching its expectations. 1. Territorial segmentation: the authorities have tried to limit the number of seats won by the PJD in the elections of 2002 in order to avoid the same scenario, for example: the constituencies of El Fida, Ain Sbaa, El Bernoussi and Anfa. Creating constituencies of tws seats only: constituency of Ben Msik…2. Negative impartiality of the administration, the use of money, and threats to set up gangs were wide spread and not limited as declared by the minister of the interior. This is known to everyone. Except for the PJD, the Rennaisance and Virtue party and Al BAdil Al Hadari party, all have used money. 3. The silence of the Socialist Union Party over the violations of Al Istiqlal party. 4. The Istiqlal party used money in many constituencies as is the case in the constituency of Hay Al Hassani, a candidate from the Istiqlal party offered a leave to the workers in his company (around 1000 workers) and used them in the electoral campaign, and the candidate of Al Istiqlal in Fès ‘Chebat’ formed gangs threatening people. As to Yasmina Badou she made promises to every unemployed to find a job for him, and this is published in Al Massaa newspaper. 5. There is another factor; it is the low turnout as the majority of those who did not vote were sympathizing with the PJD. The absence of the voters is due to their desperation of the Moroccan regime as they know that even if all Moroccans vote for the PJD, the executives in the country and regime will not let the PJD implement its program. The TV media has also contributed to the low turnout. In spite of the transmission of ads calling people to vote, this was not complemented with creating dialog about programs, there were no TV seminars which could have moved the public. They know that in such debates, there could be a high support for the PJD. This was clear in many dialog programs which contributed to increasing the popularity of the PJD, so they forsook such programs during the electoral campaign but fell in...
ابن الصلاح المغربي Posted 2007-09-10
...the low turnout. This made it easier for the users of money to gain the support of voters by buying their votes. (Maybe this was planned). 6. Subjective reasons: The leadership of the PJD made fatal mistakes in the city of Casablanca, an important number of the prominent members of the party did not contribute to the special mobilization concerning some candidates who were recommended by the party but weren’t approved by the prominent members, for example: Mr Lahjouji in the constituency of Anfa, or Mr Lahia in the constituency of Moulay rachid, Mr Lakhili in the constituency of Ben Msik and others. The party committed a mistake which is unlike a big party when they presented Lahjouji with the symbol of the house whereas the majority knows this alliance; since the symbol of the lamp was not present, they preferred voting only on the national list, and therefore a seat was wasted away stupidly. 7. The campaign led by Zamzami had an impact on a significant number of people namely in the constituency of Anfa. 8. There war also biased ads when you try to analyze the picture. Moreover, there was a wild campaign from some of claimers of democracy as in the campaign of the association Horizons, though it had no big impact. The party should therefore learn a lesson from the experience and correct its mistakes. It should also make an auto-critic. A note about the title of your article, the Istiqlal party didn’t win the majority of the seats in the parliament, it just topped the ranking. As to the results, there were narrow differences for the first three parties: 52 for the Istiqlal, 47 (or a little higher waiting for the results of the national lists) for the PJD and 42 for the Popular movement.
Noureddine Posted 2007-09-10
"Istiqlal wins most seats"! This is a misleading headline. Do you call 16% of less than 4 million Moroccans (the lowest turnout in the history of Morocco) majority? Who represents the other 26 million others? No need for elections so far in Morocco. These elecctions are harmful to the country and hurt us more than they benifit us and they are a waste of time and money.
acharif moulay abdellah bouskraoui Posted 2007-09-11
Mr. Albas el Fassi, Congratulations on your results. I wish you good luck. I am not in your party and I did not even vote, but I do respect you being that your party has been and will always be loyal to the Alaouite throne. That is exactly what interests the Moroccan people, as they are to the Biia. Long Live the King and Long Live All Who are Loyal to Him!!!
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