Casablanca Alcohol Retailers Protest License Revocations and Closures Amid Pandemic

The Alliance had previously appealed to the local authorities to allow the establishments to reopen, given the difficulties the professionals are facing to survive so many measures enacted in the context of the health crisis. Faced with the wall of silence from the authorities, the Alliance of Free Trade Unions sent them a letter, reporting on the situation that restaurants, pubs and others are experiencing. The key message of this letter is the organization of a sit-in on September 25, starting at 10 a.m., in front of the Wilaya of the Casablanca-Settat region.

These operators are completely dismayed by the "clean hands" operation carried out by the National Security, in collaboration with the judicial police, Customs and the National Office of Sanitary Safety of Food Products (ONSSA), which took place in Had Soualem and cost the players the destruction of around 21,000 bottles of wine and 8,000 cans of beer unfit for consumption. Three people were referred to the Casablanca prosecutor’s office at the end of the operation, the same source reports.

While the operation aims to straighten out the situation and restore order in the field, it puts several people out of work and exposes them to even more precariousness, in these times of the Covid-19 crisis, it is said.