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Rabat – Thirteen women ambassadors were sworn in by King Mohammed VI of Morocco on Thursday to transmit Moroccans’ voice to the world.
The swearing-in ceremony was held in the Royal Palace in Morocco’s central-western city of Casablanca, one week after the upshots of the October 7 ballot votes were released.
65 Moroccans, men and women, were appointed to the position as the kingdom’s ambassadors to the world.
The female diplomats will speak up for Morocco across Europe, Africa, America, Asia, and Oceania.
The list includes Lalla Jumala Alaoui, the first woman to serve as Moroccan ambassador to the United States.
The twelve other ambassadors have been identified as Latifa Akharbach, Oumama Aouad, Saadia Alaoui, Nezha Alaoui Mhamedi, Nour El Houda Marrakshi, Zakia El Midaoui, Farida Louadaya, Karima Kabbaj, Lamiae Erradi, Khadija Rouissi, Kenza El Ghali, and Amina Bouayach.
The female diplomats will represent Morocco, respectively, in the following states: Tunisia, Panama, Angola, Ethiopia and Djibouti, Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria and Macedonia, Colombia and Ecuador, Hungary, Norway and Iceland, Denmark and Lithuania, Chile, and Sweden and Latvia.
An Tunisian observer told Morocco World News the move marks a watershed in Morocco’s political landscape, signaling the kingdom’s propensity towards a feminist politics, in which women not only chip in the political orb but also take a stand in the act of decision-making.
Such a pro-feminist dynamics marks itself as one of a kind in the North African region, where women have almost gone astray in the wider socio-political scene.
Largely blemished by a sexist mind-set, North Africa and the Middle East have been marked by a lower participation of women in elections and decision-making, both before and after the Arab Spring.
The lower participation of women in North African politics has been attributed to several reasons, most notably the “masculinization” of political leadership to exclude the position of women as an active agent outside the domestic sphere.
Morocco’s shift towards a feminist politics signals a belief in the role played by women in the larger diplomatic action and cross-cultural dialogue.
