Version imprimableIn fact, the essential core of the 1962 Constitution of Hassan II is still in force in Morocco. Putting real power in the hands of a single person, this Constitution makes a mockery of the popular will in order to serve the interests of a minority of local capitalists and their neo-colonialist allies – an armada of multinational enterprises which is pillaging Morocco and foreign banks which are exhausting its resources by means of the infernal mechanism of debt.
The regime refuses to make any concession that would limit its powers. It is abandoning any support for the demands of the historic “reformist” opposition, making it capitulate totally after having used it in the government of facade (called government of alternance after Abderrahman El Youssoufi was utilised as “prime minister”.)
The popular pressure exerted by the demonstrations of the Movement of February 20, 2011, in the context of the revolutionary wave that swept the region, forced the regime to make meagre concessions and minor promises, whose uncertain implementation will inevitably stretch over several decades. The concessions were proportional to the level of pressure, given that the Movement of February 20 was incapable of developing and attaining, on the quantitative and qualitative levels, enough strength to make it possible to impose real change.
Increasing poverty, endemic unemployment, the continuing destruction of what remains of the public services of health and education, the gloomy future that millions of young people see before them, the crushing oppression of which the majority of women are victims… - all these problems will no doubt become greater and worsen with whatever government of façade comes out of the electoral masquerade.
In reality the satisfaction of popular demands implies above all:
• Sweeping away the present political hypocrisy whose aim is to provide a cover for tyranny and injustice;
• The establishment of a political system that reflects the will of the majority of the workers and labouring masses.
This objective will only be attained by mass struggle conducted by the millions of victims of the existing political, economic and social system. The energies of the labouring masses will only converge towards this path if there exists a conscious vanguard which undertakes the political education of the victims of marginalisation and ignorance, for which responsibility is borne in equal measure by the regime and the opposition originating in the bourgeois national movement.
The great misfortune that has struck the workers and all the poor of Morocco is the result of the failure of the efforts to build the revolutionary socialist party of the workers, under the blows of repression on the one hand, and on the other the mistakes that have been made. This misfortune is both a cause and a consequence of the political backwardness of the popular masses, which limits their response to class oppression to spontaneous explosions of anger without any political horizons (1965, 1981, 1990…).
Because of this, the masses have become a simple instrument of pressure, profoundly unconscious, so to speak, in the hands of bourgeois forces, in particular on the trade union level, which are leading them into skirmishes which have no relation to their real interests, modelling them politically, either to run after illusions in change through elections, or to retreat into passivity and abstention in elections.
There is no other way to achieve the satisfaction of popular aspirations than by building instruments of struggle, in a democratic and combative fashion, and bringing together the most conscious elements in an autonomous party. This party will adopt the struggle outside the institutions as its principal means of action to raise the level of consciousness of the workers and the popular masses. It will work out all the tactics of struggle depending on the relationship of force between the classes – including using elected institutions as tribunes for struggle – as well as all the channels which make it possible to awaken the layers of the popular masses that have been up to now victims of political marginalisation and ignorance. Such is the vision of the revolutionary workers’ current Al Mounahdil-a, which organises today a small number activists, trade unionists and young men and women, all of them convinced that the future lies in the struggle of the working class, in spite of the enormous difficulties accumulated over decades and the pressure of the negative developments in our region over the last five years.
Our position on the present elections diverges from the so-called “boycott” as it has been practiced historically by the Moroccan left. It rejects its justification, given that the real conditions for a revolutionary boycott do not exist. It goes without saying that missing the occasion of the electoral campaign implies losing the possibility of using the tribune that is offered to us in a revolutionary way. Our current also rejects the kind of participation that sows illusions, as do the not very democratic forces which are responsible for what affects the Moroccan trade union movement, in terms of bureaucratic negligence and disastrous defeats.
The Al-Mounadhil-a current does not have the organisational strength to be able to take part in elections under an independent working-class and socialist banner. Moreover, there are no Marxist currents or a workers’ party, even reformist, to which it would be possible give critical support. However, this concrete reality must not serve to justify the maintenance of erroneous and politically absurd positions.
The regime will put in place a new government of façade in the image of the preceding governments, given that the parties competing in the elections are in unanimous agreement – even though they try to present an appearance of disagreement – to continue to implement the policies of the International Monetary Fund and the European Union.
The attacks will increase further against what remains of our rights and gains and our meagre liberties. It is our duty to take part fully in the struggles to resist, in a unitary and democratic spirit, and to organise the forces of struggle on the trade-union, popular and political levels.
Profound global change will be the result of gigantic class struggles of which the dynamic of February 20 was but a mere training exercise. Winning victory in the decisive battle will depend on the degree of political and organisational independence of the working class, developing which is the immediate task of all working-class and socialist activists in our country.
