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Rabat – Morocco’s Special Commission on the Development Model (CSMD) will launch a consultation campaign seeking the participation of prisoners.
The campaign, organized in collaboration with the General Delegation for Prison Administration and Reintegration (DGAPR), will cover all prisons in Morocco.
The initiative falls within the CSMD’s participatory approach, DGAPR said in a press release on August 7. The approach aims to involve all citizens in the preparation of Morocco’s new development model, including those from “specific categories.”
The CSMD and DGAPR are inviting all Moroccan prisoners to share in writing their conception of the “Morocco of tomorrow.” A joint committee will select the most promising contributions and publish them in a special issue of the monthly magazine “Cahier des prisonniers” (Prisoners’ Notebook), issued by DGAPR.
Meanwhile, the CSMD will publish all contributions, without exception, on the “www.csmd.ma” online platform.
Morocco’s new development model
King Mohammed VI established the CSMD in July 2019 after he acknowledged that the country’s current development model failed to meet the expectations of citizens and serve the country’s socio-economic aspirations.
The King had long criticized the previous development model, saying in 2017, “We have to admit that our national development model no longer responds to citizens’ growing demands and pressing needs.”
In his 2019 Throne Day speech, the monarch said he expects the CSMD to be “totally impartial and objective, and to report on facts as they are on the ground, however harsh or painful they may be.”
The King appointed the Moroccan Ambassador to France Chakib Benmoussa to chair the commission in November 2019.
CSMD members have met with several groups and organizations, including labor unions, entrepreneurs, activists, students, and Moroccans living in remote villages.
In April, the commission launched a website allowing all Moroccans to send proposals for Morocco’s development model. Since its launch, the platform has received over 750 recommendations from ordinary citizens and hundreds more from organizations.
While the CSMD was initially set to present Morocco’s new development model in June, King Mohammed VI offered the commission an additional six months, in light of the COVID-19 pandemic. The King ordered the CSMD to deliver their work no later than early January 2021.
The additional period is allowing the commission to resume and strengthen its participatory approach.
“CSMD will broaden the consultation and listening process in order to better take into account the expectations and proposals of the country’s citizens and forces in the post-COVID context,” said a statement from the commission in June.
