MP Abdellatif Ouahbi has called on the government to disclose the alleged study that informed the decision to stay on Daylight Saving Time (DST) year-round.
The minister delegate in charge of the reform of administration and public service, Mohamed Benabdelkader, said Friday, October 26 that the government had conducted a study on the time change while he announced its last-minute decision to stay on DST (GMT+1).
Ouahbi, a member of the Authenticity and Modernity Party (PAM), told Morocco World News today that Moroccan television channels and officials said that the decision was based on surveys and reports conducted by the government. “I want to see these reports,” Ouahbi said.
“No problem, show us the report so we can read them. If you can convince us with your reports, then everything will be good,” Ouahbi told MWN.
He added that he is “totally against the government’s decision until they can convince me about the psychological and the socio-economic objectives of this decision.”
The decision came at the last minute, he said, as he contrasted it with the EU’s potentially similar move away from time change in 2019 after studies and surveys. “We have not done anything alike. The EU took more than 2 years to decide on the issue. For us it took only two minutes to take this decision,” Ouahbi told MWN.
On Friday, October 26, the government adopted Draft Decree 2.18.855, adding 60 minutes to Standard Time in Morocco, moving Morocco to GMT+1 year-round. The announcement came two days before Morocco was set to turn its clocks back on Sunday, October 28.
As of today, clocks set by the internet are still displaying GMT, as if Morocco had returned to Standard Time.
The decision confused the public, and some have called on the government to reverse the decision.
However, Head of Government Saad Eddine El Othmani said that it will be risky for the government to reverse its decision and change back to Standard Time.
He said that the government adopted the decree primarily to reduce energy consumption.
It remains to be seen whether the government will make the survey public after the heavy criticism.
