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Rabat – Former secretary general of the Istiqlal Party (Independance party), Hamid Chabat, has finally decided to quit the party.
Hamid Chabat has publicly announced his intention to run as an independent in the upcoming September elections.
This announcement follows the refusal of the party to grant him a mayoral nomination in the constituency of Fez-North.
In a 40-minute video released Sunday, August 1, the disgraced politician enumerates his reasons for leaving the party he led for over a decade.
Posing in front of the national flag and that of the Istiqlal, the former mayor of Fez announced that he is leaving the party, as he failed to convince the party’s current leadership to grant him a nomination in the upcoming elections.
He fiercely attacked his successor, Nizar Baraka, whom he accused of plotting to destroy the party and the city of Fez.
He then claimed that Baraka had contacted the leaders of other parties to ask them not to give him a nomination. However, he hinted that he might run under the banner of another political party, a claim he denied just last month.
Chabat says he was deliberately excluded by Nizar Baraka and Ould Rachid from any legislative or communal candidacy.
Over the weekend, the Istiqlal party granted the nomination to the candidacy of Abdelmajid Fassi, son of Abbas El Fassi, in the constituency Fez-North, coveted by Chabat.
For his part Nizar Baraka has long maintained that Chabata is no longer fit to run for mayor in Fez, considered to be Morocco’s cultural and spiritual capital.
In a statement on July 7, Istiqlal’s current secretary general argued that the city of Fez needs “young executives, new faces and a new dynamic because of the importance that the Istiqlal gives to this city.”
Chabat has had years to prove his competence. But the career politician failed both as a Secretary General of the historic party, and as mayor of Fez.
Corruption, abandonment of office, nepotism, and unscrupulous behavior are just the tip of the scandal iceberg he’s become infamous for.
Not only is he undeserving of another mandate, critics have pointed out, he should also face the legal consequences of his political ineptitude and corrupt activities, from which the city of Fez and the Istiqlal party are still recovering.
Hamid Chabat is relentless in his constant quest for political office, but his opportunistic behavior and apparent disregard for the Moroccan electorate has not gone unnoticed.
Many Morccans and Istiqlal sympathizers, especially in the city of Fez, have had enough of his antics. And as Moroccans prepare to vote in the legislative and municipal elections this September, it is important to remember that politicians like Chabat have a track record of impressive electioneering coupled with failed leadership and lousy policymaking once in office.
Research, accountability and informed voting, should be crucial guides in this upcoming election – because Morocco is in dire need of an electoral revolution that will make it impossible for the likes of Chabat to hold public office.
