Moroccan Justice Minister: Societal Conservatism Challenges Reform Efforts

The will for change is wearing out in the face of "a very conservative society". This is the reading of Mohamed Aujjar, Minister of Justice and Freedoms. According to him, this society must be subjected to "pedagogy".

Making the Kingdom "a parliamentary, democratic and social monarchy" remains a "historic challenge" for which "preparing society" is necessary, the minister told EFE.

Addressing issues such as the abolition of the death penalty, the decriminalization of extramarital sexual relations and homosexual relations, which link the Kingdom to the Old Continent, he affirms: "The European Union is the system of values that we share, and we are preparing society [but] it is a society very attached to certain traditions, which is in a [Arab] region crossed by fundamentalism and obscurantism".

On the other hand, he hammers that the repeal of the most controversial laws in the Kingdom, in particular those criminalizing homosexuality, adultery or non-observance of fasting during Ramadan, "is not for tomorrow". To achieve this, "society will have to be prepared gradually and without shocks", he indicates.