Casablanca Revokes Parking Guard Licenses Linked to Officials’ Families

Change in the allocation of guarding licenses in Casablanca. The city hall has decided to withdraw all authorizations granted to relatives and families of former and current elected officials, as well as civil servants benefiting from a rental income from the public domain for car parking, reports Assabah. This decision follows the finding that many elected officials and civil servants had obtained guarding licenses for the benefit of their relatives, which is a "fraudulent" method, these "family" rents generating millions of dirhams each year.

In addition to this decision, the Casablanca city hall has decided to regulate the guarding licenses in a new specification and has already established precise social criteria for their allocation. From now on, people in precarious situations, such as people with disabilities, widows, divorcees, people without stable income, those over 40 without stable employment, as well as the unemployed able to justify their situation with official documents, are priority and privileged. People without resources with a family to support, or who can justify seniority in their job search, can also obtain the guarding licenses. Beneficiaries of previous licenses can still obtain them. They must first meet the aforementioned criteria.

Several conditions likely to limit anarchy in this sector are imposed on the beneficiaries of the licenses. These include respecting the authorized area of the license, which must not exceed 70 meters maximum on a single side of the public road, the prohibition of any anarchic expansion on the public domain, respecting the assigned place without the possibility of moving to another location without prior authorization, the display of an identification plate mentioning the name of the guard, his photo, his license number, the place of surveillance and the logo of the municipality, as well as the mandatory wearing of a uniform vest bearing this logo, in accordance with a model established by the municipality.

Other measures: prohibition of imposing illegal rates or using force to demand payment, respect for the laws governing the exploitation of the municipal public domain, prohibition of using the license to carry out other activities. License holders must also preserve the cleanliness of the exploited spaces.