Government Spokesperson: Morocco Announces Celebrating the Amazigh New Year

Rabat – Morocco will officially celebrate the Amazigh New Year in 2022, said the spokesperson of the Moroccan government Mustapha Baitas in a press conference on December 23.

Baitas stressed that the government dedicated a fund of MAD 200 million ($21 million) in the 2022 Finance Bill to institutionalize the Amazigh language, to allow Moroccans who speak Arabic and/or Tamazight to easily communicate in their language while visiting private or public institutions.

“Tamazight should not only be a language for communication but should also play a role in the economic and social development of the country,” he said, noting that the government is vowing to make more initiatives promoting the language.

Akhannouch’s government has long expressed its ambitions to catch up on the delay of officializing the Amazigh language in the country as it already took the kingdom almost eight years to pass an organic law that institutionalized Amazigh.

According to the governmental plan, the fund is to integrate Tamazight in education and legislation as well as in cultural and artistic fields, in addition to reinforcing the cultural and linguistic equity that will accompany the institutionalization of Amazigh.

Id Yennayer, January 12, marks the first day of the Amazigh (Berber) agrarian calendar. Next year, the Imazighen New Year celebrations will fall on Wednesday, marking the 2972nd Yennayer or “Amazigh New Year.”

Several activists have called on Morocco to make Id Yennayer a national and public holiday. The calls have increased since neighboring country Algeria made January 12 an official national holiday in 2018.

The Yennayer festivities are unique in their way as Amazigh villages often host parades accompanied by traditional food and Amazigh music.