By IPS Correspondents
CASABLANCA, Aug 2 1999 (IPS)

The unexpected amnesty granted to political prisoners by Morocco’s new king Mohammed VI on the first day of his effective reign raised great expectations about fundamental political change in this north-African country.

But local analysts adopted a cautious tone, as democratic reform in Morocco will have to pass through unveiling king Hassan’s rule dark side. Some say Mohammed would like to establish a modern -and safer against republican temptations – institution modelled on Spain.

In an apparent move to do away with his father’s human rights record, king Mohammed VI pardoned 7,988 prisoners, mostly youngsters, while another 38,224 inmates had their jail terms reduced.

The move was warmly welcomed by the inmates’ families who rushed over the weekend to greet the newly-released at jails’ gates all over the country.

“It is this great interest that the new King gives to the poor and the youth that ensures the stability of Morocco, after the death of king Hassan,” says Amina, who came to meet her 27-year old brother at the gate the Zaki jail of Sale, Rabat ‘s twin city.

The Moroccan press published Monday photos of released inmates and their families celebrating the King’s decision. The freed inmates include activists of the outlawed Al-Adl Wa Al-Ihssan (Justice and Charity) Association, whose leader, Sheikh Abdeslam Yassin, is under house arrest in Sale.

“The new King’s solicitude and will to operate more changes is yet to be seen,” Najib, an educated young man with a cautious tone said..

In his first speech to the nation a week after he was proclaimed King of Morocco after the death of his father, Hassan II, Mohammed VI said he will endeavour to make of Morocco a genuine state of law, where human rights and democracy will be reinvigorated.

But the country’s civil society and non-governmental organisations, whose number proliferated in the last years of Hassan’s rule, still adopt a wait-and-see policy, abstaining from any fundamental comments.

“The King has outlined Morocco’s problems. We will see how the government will work on the problems identified by the King,” says a member of the Moroccan independent Human Rights Organisation (OMDH). “What is certain is that things will start moving.”

Political observers in the Moroccan capital city say that the amnesty decreed by the new King is a strong signal that heralds more daring changes.

“The new king has no choice,” says Mostapha Alawi, Director of a local newspaper banned during Hassan’s rule. “He is compelled to operate genuine democratic changes to enable Morocco be in tune with the 21st century.”

“King Hassan was not a king. He was a sultan. There’s a big difference between a king and a sultan,” he said. “The sultan is the most powerful person in the country. He does everything,” Alawi said.

The economic and political reforms that king Hassan claimed to have started remained for its most part a facade, meant to please World Bank officials and foreign financial and business circles, uneasy about dealing with a government perecived as involved in widespread rights violations.

At the same time, Hassan cultivated a tight relationship with the United States and kept close business and cultural relations with the hundred of thousands of Morocco-Jews who had emigrated to Israel, which allowed him to play a privileged role in the Middle East conflict.

“He (Mohammed) should exploit his reputation as a man with no blood on the hands,” says a senior government official who asked not to be identified.

King Hassan, who was the longest serving Middle-East ruler until he died of heart failure on July 23, was notorious of ruthlessly quelling leftist putschists who attempted to kill him twice.

Haunted by a feeling of insecurity, Hassan tightened his iron fist on society in the 1960s gagging liberties and throwing the elite of the country’s new generation of politicians in the desolate desert jail of Tazmammart, in southern Morocco, which was not listed in the country’s prisons.

Under international pressure, Hassan started in the mid-1990’s to show signs of clemency, releasing hundreds of prisoners and paying reparations to the families of those reported missing during Morocco’s darkest years.

“King Hassan was not a genuine democrat, because of his feeling of insecurity,” the government official said.

Besides his bleak human rights record, King Hassan bequeathed to his son a country torn by various social and economic ailments, particularly affecting a mostly young population.

Poor education and health systems, high unemployment rates (20 per cent of the work force), as well as a costly 23-year war to control the Western Sahara have put Morocco well behind its neighbours and partners in the Mahgrebian Union, Algeria and Tunisia, on the world development ranking.

“It is shameful for a country like Morocco to have illiteracy rates of more than 50 per cent in this end of the 20th century,” says Mohammed Najili, an economic chronicler.

The exodus of thousands of desperate unemployed people, especially youngsters, towards Europe is the most tragic embodiment of Morocco’s social chaos. In eight years, more than 300,000 Moroccans tried to cross the troubled waters of Gibraltar towards Europe.

Some of these ‘harragas,’ those who leave everything behind in search of a more dignified life in Europe, succeed in their great escape and become part of the legions of second-class citizens in the northern side of the Mediterranean. Others, less lucky, perish in the attempt or fall in the hands of Spanish police.

The new king’s involvement in various charitable actions in favour of the poor during the time he served in the shadow of his powerful father raised great expectations among the youth.

“We are hopeful that king Mohammed will continue his care for the poor and the youth,” says 28-year-old Toufik Khouni, who recalls the then prince distributing food and clothes to the poor last year and finding jobs for the unemployed who used to line up near his home in Sale.

“King Hassan was a king of the rich, and I hope king Mohammed will be the King of the poor,” he said.

A new elite of rich investors, especially in the city of Fez (central Morocco), was encouraged by Hassan, himself the country’s richest man, with vast agricultural and commercial interests, now inherited by Mohammed. His motto was “get wealthy, but don’t touch politics.”

The new King, who vowed to continue working with the centre- left government of Socialist prime minister Abderrahmane Youssoufi – once a jailed government foe – risks to see his action hampered by a handful of powerful members of the old guard that helped his father in his four-decade reign.

The government, which raised expectations when it was first installed in March 1998, had its manoeuvring margin considerably reduced by the Palace ministers it was force to accept, especially the Interior minister, Driss Basri, whose authority is second only to the King’s.

It is not certain how people like Basri will fit in the new era of change.

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