Rabat – Morocco’s Salé Provincial Directorate of the Ministry of National Education has ordered private schools in the province to stop forcing students and their families to buy schoolbooks and educational supplies from their institutions.
The directive also bans schools from sending parents to specific bookstores to purchase textbooks and other school materials.
The measure comes ahead of the 2026-2027 school year and is based on Article 51 of Law No. 59.21 on school education, which was published in Morocco’s Official Gazette on February 23. The article explicitly prohibits private schools from requiring students or their parents to buy books, educational materials, or school supplies from the school, or directing them to a specific bookstore.
The Salé Directorate called on private school managers to fully comply with the law and with the conditions of their administrative licenses. It also reminded them that their main role is to provide educational services and urged them to respect the existing legal framework governing private education.
Booksellers welcome move
The decision follows complaints from Moroccan booksellers, who have long argued that some private schools have been selling textbooks and school supplies directly to families or requiring parents to buy them from selected outlets.
Booksellers say these practices create unfair competition, particularly because the start of the school year is one of their most important business periods. The Moroccan Booksellers Association has previously called on the Education Ministry to take stronger action against schools that sell books or direct families to particular sellers.
The association welcomed recent instructions from education authorities, but said the main challenge is now ensuring that the rules are actually enforced across the country. It has argued that the measures should not remain limited to individual provinces and that authorities should monitor schools and respond to complaints from booksellers and families.
The issue is not new. Booksellers have complained for years that some private schools use their position to control where families purchase textbooks. Many booksellers reported cases in which private schools were selling textbooks themselves.
Protecting families and competition
The new rules are also intended to give parents greater freedom to choose where they buy school materials.
Supporters of the measure say allowing families to compare prices between bookstores can help protect them from unnecessary costs while giving independent booksellers a fair chance to compete.
The directive is part of a broader effort to apply Law No. 59.21, which aims to update the legal framework governing school education in Morocco. The law was adopted as part of reforms intended to strengthen equality of opportunity and improve the regulation of the education system.
Similar instructions have recently been issued in other parts of Morocco, including Mediouna in the Casablanca-Settat region, suggesting that the authorities are moving toward wider enforcement of the rules governing private schools and the sale of schoolbooks.
