Controversial Café in Moroccan Roundabout Sparks Public Outrage Despite Official Approval

On Facebook, the Urban Agency of Khémisset has sought to "clarify the circumstances of the case and defend the legitimacy of the project". It thus affirmed that the project is "authorized" and that the owner of the café has a specific property certificate for the roundabout, registered in his name at the land registry. This has sparked a wave of outrage and strong reactions from Moroccan Internet users. According to them, this type of project should be located in places intended for this purpose and not in public sites intended for public use. "Whoever finds a roundabout, let him put it in his name," ironizes an activist on social networks, indicating that the situation resembles an open invitation for anyone who finds a public site to take possession of it.

For Moroccan Internet users, the clarifications of the urban agency of Khémisset are synonymous with an attempt to justify a flagrant violation of the law, since the construction of this café in the middle of a roundabout constitutes a violation of the provisions of Article 4 of Law No. 19.57 relating to the regime of real estate property of local authorities, in particular the first paragraph. This stipulates that the public domain of local authorities includes all real estate intended for the direct use of the public or the management of a public service, such as roads and their dependencies not classified in the public domain of the State. Furthermore, the first paragraph of Article 4 of Law No. 19.57 specifies that roundabouts are part of the dependencies of roads and are intended for public use.