Morocco: the earthquake reveals the cracks between Rabat and Paris

On Sunday, French President Emmanuel Macron indicated that his country was ready "to intervene" to help Morocco, hit by a violent earthquake that has caused more than 2,100 deaths. Until now, the kingdom has not accepted France’s aid. This position of Rabat is explained by the fact that there are "political considerations at stake," decodes Gabriel Martinez-Gros, historian and emeritus professor at the University of Nanterre with France Info, explaining that the "crisis is not very serious, but it is significant of a very deep situation." "There is a third partner that we are not talking about - because it is not the time in the serious circumstances of this earthquake - it is Algeria. France is facing these two former colonies, completely opposed in principle, the decolonizations were very different. In short, everything opposes Algeria and Morocco, and France has not chosen and probably cannot choose," he explains further.

The Sahara issue is one of the points of friction. "In general, Morocco and Morocco vis-à-vis Algeria always demand a privileged position from France. With this idea: It is not normal that you grant such a right to Algeria when you do not grant it to Morocco, when you know very well that Morocco has supported you much more than Algeria in international bodies and in general in all the crises that France has been able to go through," completes the historian. That is why "it is very clear that today the countries, including Morocco, which are receiving aid, are the countries of the Abraham group, those who have admitted that the Western Sahara [at the heart of a diplomatic conflict between Algeria and Morocco] was Moroccan. Those who are pushing Morocco and the Islamic world in general towards a regularization with Israel for example," he analyzes.

Another factor mentioned: the lack of the privileged relationship that existed between the French presidents and the late Hassan II, the father of King Mohammed VI. "It is likely that the personal factor of Emmanuel Macron plays a role. A kind of lack of warmth that is not appreciated, both in Morocco and, it seems, in many sub-Saharan African countries. There is a generational shift that is a bit difficult to make between the thunderous but popular Jacques Chirac who knew how to shake hands, embrace very widely, and Emmanuel Macron who has more trouble doing so, that’s for sure," concludes the academic.