Abderrahim El Ouali
21 August 2007
Casablanca — A new press law has created a regulatory council comprising journalists that some fear could lead to censorship by media persons rather than the government.
The new law provides for setting up a National Press Council (NPC) to deal with complaints of excesses within the media. The law does not specify what these complaints could be but sets out what the NPC could do about them.
"There are disciplinary sanctions such as admonitory letters, cancelling the professional card for three to five years, and fines as well," Said Essoulami, executive director of the Centre for Media Freedom in Middle East and North Africa (CMFMENA) told IPS. CMFMENA is an independent group with headquarters in London and a supporting office in Casablanca.
The new legislation follows several other acts passed ostensibly to defend and promote freedom of the media. "Amendments of the press law have been made frequently since the country entered what is commonly known as the democratic transition," Youssef Saket, a journalist with the Assabah (Dawn) newspaper told IPS.
The democratic transition began with the appointment of opposition leader Abderrahmane Youssoufi as prime minister by King Hassan II in 1998. Under constitutional monarchy in Morocco, the prime minister is appointed by the king.
But the democratic transition, that supposedly continued under the present monarch Mohammed VI who came to the throne Jul. 30, 1999, has meant that tough laws that provide for imprisonment for journalists for publishing offences remain in place.
"This has led to strong reservations about the law," Saket said. "It can mean hindering professional work because the judiciary itself is not fully independent."
The Syndicate of Journalists (SNPM) and the Federation of Publishers (FP) have been lobbying since 2002 for a new law that would end imprisonment for journalists. Besides denial of freedom, "incarcerating journalists gives an unsuitable image abroad of the efforts within Morocco towards democracy and public freedoms," Saket said.
Under the new bill journalists can be imprisoned for defaming the king and the princes, and for endangering territorial unity. That usually means references to Western Sahara where the political group, the Polisario, has been fighting for independence from Morocco.
The Polisario was set up in 1973. The conflict over Western Sahara continues, though Moroccan and Polisario leaders have held two rounds of negotiations in the United States, and will meet again in Switzerland.
But despite past promises, tough laws have been kept in place. Youssoufi, who was prime minister from 1998 to 2003, maintained the law that could ban a newspaper without giving it the right to appeal. He invoked the law to ban two publications, Assahifa and Le Journal in 2000.
In the wake of such laws and practices, many journalists fear that the NPC could become an instrument for censorship.
"The NPC will be doing what the government does no more -- ban newspapers. This means journalists will begin to censor other journalists, and this is very dangerous," Saket said.
Essoulami said the NPC mandate goes beyond professional duties. Under the bill, the NPC can rule on journalists' conduct socially and even privately. "We all know from experience that it was pure fascism that tried to create modelled persons who all look alike."
This would be an antidemocratic measure, he said. "Only dictatorships take such control over journalists."
Other journalists fear that civil society representatives within the NPC can make the wrong judgments because they are not media professionals. Again, there are fears that like the judiciary, civil society too is not independent, and that most members of non-government organisations have political affiliations.
While the setting up of the NPC is awaited with some apprehension, journalists continue to face imprisonment under the present law. Abderrahim Ariri, managing director of the newspaper al-Watan al-Ane (Motherland Now) and Mustapha Hormatallah, journalist with the same newspaper, have been imprisoned on charge of publishing defence secrets.
The paper carried excerpts from reports by intelligence services on fighting terrorism. The two arrested men were asked to reveal the names of the sources for the report. Moroccan law does not allow journalists to keep their sources secret.
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