News: Divide and Rule vs Solidarity

The Moroccan state’s continued occupation of Western Sahara is often attributed to its need to play the nationalist card to maintain support for the monarchy and the military-business establishment. Many analyses gloss over whether this works. A number of recent events highlight the need to examine this more closely, and remind us that the Moroccan people are not as attached to the continued occupation of the Sahara as their rulers would like us to believe.

May Day 2003
A Moroccan workers’ organisation, the Confederation Democratique du Travail (Democratic Labour Confederation) had planned a May Day march in El Ayoun in Western Sahara – to which members of the besieged human rights organisation, the “Forum for Truth & Justice: Sahara Section” were invited. On the eve of May 1st, the Moroccan authorities banned the march specifically because of the planned involvement of the Saharawi human rights activists, on the grounds that they supported independence and were likely to cause “disorder”! Refusing to be intimidated, a crowd, including some members of the Sahara Section, assembled on May 1st – with a substantial police presence for company… Unable to go ahead with the full march, Moroccan trade union officials instead led the crowd in chanting their solidarity with the Sahara Section and denouncing human rights abuses in Western Sahara.

Dissolution of the Sahara Section of the Forum for Truth & Justice postponed
In another example of cross-community solidarity in the occupied territories of Western Sahara, the May 7th hearing on the proposed dissolution of the Sahara Section of the Forum for Truth and Justice was attended by a large public crowd, composed not only of Saharawi human rights activists and other Saharawis, but also by a number of prominent Moroccan trade unionists and human rights activists. Three Moroccan lawyers, members of the Moroccan Forum for Truth and Justice, wrote to the court in El Ayoun in defence of their Saharawi colleagues. The Forum is itself an excellent example of the kind of thing the Moroccan state perhaps fears the most – Moroccans working with pro-independence Saharawis to call the state to account for human rights crimes.

Moroccan Press Freedom – Lmrabet on Hunger Strike
Meanwhile, Ali Lmrabet, editor of Demain and Doumane magazines, is currently on hunger strike in prison. He is awaiting trial for insulting the King, the state and threatening the territorial integrity of the Kingdom following the publication of an interview with an exiled member of the Moroccan Republican Party, who expressed support for Saharawi independence. Lmrabet has not called for Saharawi independence himself – he has just defended his right to publish debate about it. The Saharawi Union of Journalists and Writers of Saguia El Hamra and Rio de Oro (UJESARIO) has expressed its support for him and denounced the Moroccan regimes actions against press freedom.

Moroccan Democratic Youth Abroad under fire from Secret Police
In a statement, the NGO Moroccan Democratic Youth Abroad has protested against a campaign of threats and anonymous phone calls made to its members "which take us back to a period we thought was over". This organisation has participated in constructive meetings with the POLISARIO-backed Saharawi youth organisation UJSARIO in Europe over the last year.

What does all this add up to? Firstly, that there are plenty of Moroccans who have seen through the lies of their government about Western Sahara. They know that there is a Saharawi people; that the Saharawis want independence; and they are even willing to risk their own personal safety to meet with them. They may well perceive that they have a common enemy in the shadowy elite of the Moroccan establishment. Secondly, that the Moroccan state is absolutely determined to stamp on any such genuine cross-community “confidence building”. But all over Morocco and Western Sahara, and beyond, ordinary people are making person-to-person contacts which show Moroccans that they have nothing to fear from an independent Western Sahara.

Overview: UN Revelations

James Baker recently presented the UN Security Council with the responses of the parties (POLISARIO Front, Morocco, Mauritania and Algeria) to his latest proposals. Kofi Annan is due to present his next report to the Council on May 19th. Still officially secret, the proposals are rumoured to be a reworking of his controversial “Draft Framework Agreement” which sees an autonomous province of Western Sahara within Morocco as a basis for peace. The publication by Spanish newspaper “El Pais” of extracts from a recent book by a former UN diplomat has stirred up speculation about Baker’s role and the autonomy plan.

In his recent memoirs “Peacemonger”, British former UN diplomat Marrack Goulding recalls being sent by Annan to persuade Baker to take the Western Sahara job to “ try to negotiate a deal based on enhanced autonomy for Western Sahara within the Kingdom of Morocco”.

Shortly after taking the job in 1997, Mr Baker toured the region and met with Morocco and the POLISARIO Front. He declared that the referendum was still possible – and the Saharawis’ spirits soared. By 2000, the voter list was published. However, within a year, he had responded to Morocco’s attempt to lodge 130,000 appeals from rejected voters by putting forward the “Draft Framework Agreement”, which proposed integration of Western Sahara into Morocco as a province with “limited autonomy” and the holding of a referendum where Moroccan colonists would hold the majority.

Mr Baker might say that he took the job prepared to look at any potential solution to the conflict in Western Sahara; that his declaration of faith in the Settlement Plan was genuine and made only after Morocco surprisingly said it was willing to proceed; and that the autonomy proposals only surfaced after later problems. Goulding, however, told El Pais that the autonomy plan had been in existence since Perez de Cuellar’s days as UN Secretary General in the early 1990s. This has prompted speculation that Baker and Annan were only pushing the Settlement Plan to extract concessions on autonomy from Morocco.

Perez de Cuellar’s complicity
Goulding also deals with the drawing up of the UN Settlement Plan in 1990-91. He believes that the Moroccan state were never genuinely committed to the plan, and only agreed to it when it became clear that Moroccan provocations and obstructions would not be punished by the UN. He refers in particular to Morocco’s moving of 170,000 colonists into the territory of Western Sahara at a crucial stage: his attempt to complain about this was squashed by Perez de Cuellar. Perez de Cuellar later stated in his autobiography that he was not in favour of Saharawi independence, and that shortly after leaving the UN he was offered a senior position with the Moroccan company Omnium Nord Africain.

It is difficult to pluck the truth out of this tangled web of possibilities. But it seems that the truth now is that the autonomy plan is unworkable. Although it is rumoured to have increased the amount of autonomy that Western Sahara would have inside Morocco, it still advocates years of ”transition” under Moroccan rule with a referendum loaded with Moroccan colonists – which will likely lead to full integration into Morocco. It asks the Saharawi people to trust the Moroccan state to respect the terms of the transition and beyond. Understandably, they have no faith in the word of the Moroccan regime, and so they also have no faith in the autonomy plan. They feel only a true referendum of self-determination, implemented by a robust UN, can protect their safety and their rights.