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Doha – Despite its previously hostile editorial line towards Morocco, the French television channel France 24 has recently updated its geographical representation of the country.
Breaking from past practices, the channel now displays a complete map of Morocco, including its southern provinces in the Sahara.
This significant shift aligns France 24, which is affiliated with the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs, with France’s new official position recognizing Moroccan sovereignty over Western Sahara.
The change comes despite reported reluctance from some within the channel, Moroccan journalist Dounia Nouar highlighted in a video on TikTok.
France 24’s move follows a similar adjustment by France 5, another public television channel, which began broadcasting the full map of Morocco in early August.
The updated representation aims to educate the French public about Morocco’s geographical and political reality, well-known to the country’s former protectors (1912-1956) who are intimately familiar with the true borders of the Cherifian Empire.
In addition to the television channels, the current school year in France has been marked by most textbooks displaying a complete map of Morocco, from Tangier to Lagouira.
This has garnered significant attention from the Moroccan community in France, with photos of various textbooks circulating on social media.
The textbook updates mark a pivotal moment in the French education system, signaling notable progress in France’s recognition of Moroccan sovereignty over the Sahara and the legitimacy of the Autonomy Plan proposed in 2007 to resolve the Sahara issue.
Read also: Colonialism and Conflict: Facts About the Map of Morocco
France 24’s anti-Moroccan bias has been a point of contention in the past.
French Senator Christophe-André Frassa strongly denounced the channel’s anti-Semitic and anti-Moroccan media treatment last year, blaming the Algerian regime for the channel’s deep-rooted hostility toward Morocco.
Frassa highlighted the “deleterious situation” within France 24’s Arabic editorial team, where Franco-Moroccan journalists faced stigmatization and dismissal for refusing to yield to an anti-Zionist and anti-Semitic line that had taken hold since Morocco normalized relations with Israel.
But as a television channel wholly owned by the French state, France 24 now finds itself in a position of having to uphold and promote Morocco’s sovereignty over its southern provinces, a stance many of its journalists are still believed to oppose.
According to reports, the French government is facing calls to ensure that journalists are not unfairly dismissed for reasons that affront both professional ethics and the principles France 24 is meant to promote.
This means it remains to be seen whether having embraced Morocco’s stance on the Sahara dispute, France 24 will allow coverage that questions Moroccan territorial integrity.
