Moroccan Opposition Leader Threatens Protests Over Family Law Reform

While voices are being raised to demand the reform of the Penal Code and the Moudawana (Family Code), Abdelilah Benkirane threatens to organize large marches against the Minister of Justice, Abdellatif Ouahbi, to dissuade him from any haste in this file. The boss of the PJD believes that the government should not give in to the pressure of those who seek to destroy "the family unit", reports the daily Assabah.

He asked him "to listen to the different opinions as well as those who are opposed to his convictions, instead of asking women’s organizations to support him to materialize what has been planned and what he personally aspires to." Benkirane’s reservations mainly target "the marriage of homosexuals" which he considers "the first factor that threatens the disappearance of peoples after the cessation of procreation and demographic growth".

The Secretary General of the PJD also refuses to "endorse individual freedoms by calling on the members of his party to engage in an intellectual confrontation with the modernists on subjects such as the decriminalization of consensual sexual relations between adults." The king, continues Benkirane, "is the arbiter who intervenes to guarantee the political and social balance by always siding with his people".

It should be noted that in his speech on the occasion of the celebration of the Throne Day, King Mohammed VI called for a "just and bold reform of the Family Code", in order to allow women to fully play their role in society. For the sovereign, "it is not a question of granting privileges to women as a favor, but of allowing them to benefit from their most legitimate rights".