Until Wednesday evening, Lahcen Daoudi was Minister of General Affairs. Did he resign of his own accord or was he forced to do so by his peers in the PJD who blamed him for showing solidarity with Centrale Danone’s employees demonstrating in front of Parliament against the lockout decisions?
On reading the communiqué issued by the general secretariat of Mr Saad Eddine El Othmani’s party, which had already vehemently admonished his colleague and ‘brother’, issued during the night of Tuesday 5th June to Wednesday 6th June, one might rightfully believe that the ‘activist-Minister’ was compelled to resign, rather than choosing to leave a government criticised for its inertia (the least that can be said) in managing the boycott crisis.
This decision represents the first fall-out of the boycott campaign, impacting the political landscape and the politicians themselves. Although it does not come as much of a surprise, it does, however, raise a number of issues not only for political decision-makers but citizens too.
In fact, is a government minister first and foremost a citizen and, potentially a member of a political party, or, as a member of the executive, is he not duty-bound to confidentiality?
Was Lahcen Daoudi ousted because he broke the moral contract which bound him to the government team or was it because he openly expressed his solidarity with Moroccan citizens who were employees of a multinational enterprise and who were tossed out into the street in the middle of the month of Ramadan?
Given the insults that rained down on him on social media by the PJD’s grassroots ‘activists’ for having exercised his freedom of conscience, it is undoubtedly because he took a stand against the boycott that Lahcen Daoudi was expelled from the government team…
And to such an extent, in fact, that the communiqué issued by the Islamist party urged its supporters to refrain from attacking the future former Minister of General Affairs!
The PJD’s leadership and Mr Saad Eddine El Othmani in particular have adopted a position that is as clear-cut as it is dangerous, by expressing and clearly stating that this party and its government representatives basically refuse to oppose the boycott movement launched on 20th April…
They have shown their true colours on this occasion (the boycott); official recognition has been given by the head of the government himself to the practice of saying one thing and meaning another!
Daoudi would not have been excluded if he had not supported the hundreds of employees dismissed unceremoniously as a result of a movement which had begun on social media, and whose founders, in the wake of this PJD minister’s sacking, are not so anonymous anymore…
Because no one will believe that merely expressing a ‘different’ opinion has resulted in a member of the government being carted off manu militari in the middle of the night!
If that were indeed the reason, then the El Othmani team would have undoubtedly been decimated already on account of the series of ministerial postures occurring in recent months, as illustrated by the episode of RNI ministers sulking and boycotting (already!) a cabinet meeting and refusing to participate in the head of government’s tour to the Eastern region.
This latest government incident says a great deal, a very great deal about the state of decay in which the majority coalition finds itself.
The boycott of Centrale Danone’s dairy products has provoked a systemic crisis in an industry that is strategically productive for both the domestic economy and several million, mainly rural, citizens.
Public opinion, or at least the opinion expressed on social media which is broadly representative, aware of the dramatic consequences inflicted on 200,000 families, as the Minister Aziz Akhannouch pointed out to a parliamentary commission on the evening of 5th June, has still not understood that the boycott is harmful to the most disadvantaged sections of society, those on small incomes, rather than a multinational enterprise that will very quickly endeavour to ‘limit the damage’, as we have seen.
Despite Centrale Danone losing significant market share and seeing its profits melt like butter in the sun, other milk producers have taken the helm, although the latter are already alleged to have cheated on the quality of the milk distributed to consumers!
So, who is right in this affair, Lahcen Daoudi, who courageously took up the cause of angry workers, ever faithful to his reputation as a committed activist, or the PJD, its grassroots supporters and its leaders, held hostage by social media, incapable of weaning themselves off their populist habit and lacking the courage that is sometimes required of swimming against the tide?
The head of government, Saad Eddine El Othmani, must therefore ask King Mohammed VI to accept Lahcen Daoudi’s resignation.
Might the Sovereign refuse it?
Fahd YATA
Original article : https://lnt.ma/lahcen-daoudi-vire-gouvernement-quoppose-boycott/