Tangier’s Last Urban Forest Threatened: Luxury Resort Plan Sparks Environmental Showdown

Sale of a large plot of land covering an area of 47,000 square meters, on which it is planned to build a tourist complex comprising 52 luxury villas and a four-story hotel with 112 rooms in the Rmilat forest. This tourism project is not to the liking of the people of Tangier, particularly environmental activists. For the latter, this forest is considered a natural space for the city’s inhabitants and an ecological lung protected by law, where any urban activity threatening its ecological balance is prohibited. They believe that any construction in the area constitutes a crime against the environment and a violation of the laws governing urban planning.

Civil society associations, and first and foremost environmental organizations, are calling on the local authorities to open an urgent investigation and to stop any attempt to manipulate the adopted urban plans. They are brandishing the threat of an escalation if attempts to encroach on the forest continue. A conflict between real estate magnates in Tangier for the control of this project, and environmental defenders, is plausible.

For the time being, the fate of the project remains shrouded in uncertainty, due to a conflict of interest between the real estate lobbies, and widespread popular demands for the protection of Rmilat, considered a collective environmental and tourist wealth.