DEATH PENALTY-MOROCCO: Abolitionists Resigned To Long Wait

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Abderrahim El Ouali

CASABLANCA, Mar 17 2008 (IPS) - The Moroccan ruling and political establishment continue to give conflicting signals about the future of the death penalty, leaving human rights activists now convinced that a behind-the-scenes decision has been made to keep the death penalty on the statute books for the foreseeable future.

Two weeks before the U.N General Assembly vote on an execution moratorium last December, Moroccan minister of justice Abdelouahed Radi told parliament that the country was not ready to abolish the death penalty.

“We are abstaining from voting on the abolition of the death penalty because we have not yet resolved the issue,” Radi told MPs after being questioned by the Socialist Coalition group. The coalition is one of several parties that currently make up the government.

Radi’s statement raised questions about the fate of the work of the commission of the jurists set up to review the Moroccan criminal code. Mohamed Bouzabaa, a previous justice minister, had suggested that most lawyers on the commission supported striking out capital punishment.

Days after the announcement that Morocco would abstain in the U.N. moratorium vote, Abdellatif Ouamou, the president of the Socialist Coalition in parliament made clear publicly that he supported death penalty abolition.

“Execution is a crime,” he told the newspaper al-Ahdath al-Maghribia. “It is unacceptable to punish one crime by committing another.”

At the same time, Ouamou called for civil society organisations to keep up their struggle for abolition – but with “more engagement”.

The apparent clash of opinions on the death penalty issue between prominent politicians from the same party is explained by some as due to the dominating influence of the King Mohammed VI. The Moroccan government is under the full control of the King who presides over a weekly council of ministers. Radi, in his official ministerial function, was seen as expressing the views of the King, though they were contrary to the declared abolitionist position of his party.

“The death penalty is a repressive state instrument used to stifle social demands,” Mohammed Hanafi, a member of the Moroccan Human Rights Association (AMDH) told IPS later. AMDH is part of the coalition of rights associations, including Amnesty International and the Moroccan Forum for Truth and Equity. It was set up in 2003.

Hanafi added that by retaining the death penalty, the Moroccan leadership was blocking “any movement to improve the economic, social, cultural and political situation.”

Activists acknowledge that the death sentence has not been carried out since 1993. But they have expressed concern over the recent extension in the scope of the capital punishment laws. In response to the threat from terrorism, the Moroccan parliament passed an anti-terrorism law in 2003. This made ordinary crimes punishable with the death penalty if judged as terrorist crimes. Some death sentences have been handed down under this new legislation.

Many of those sentenced to death over the past decades have had their sentences reduced to life imprisonment through royal pardons, most recently to mark the birth of the King’s daughter on Feb. 28, 2007. There are currently some 130 on death row, including seven women.

AMDH’s Hanafi appeared critical of the suggestion that human rights organisations, with more engagement, could help bring about the end to capital punishment in Morocco.

The responsibility for abolition rested with the politicians, he said. They needed to show more independence. “Most human rights NGOs are just taking orders from the political parties which are serving the interest of the state.”

Despite Hanafi’s views on the political ruling elites and the repressive effect of retaining the death penalty, Moroccans are showing increasing outspokenness on social issues, including capital punishment.

Noureddine Dayf, who was imprisoned for 11 years after taking part in the demonstrations against the high cost of living in 1981 in which hundreds of civilians were allegedly shot by the police, has been speaking publicly on the conditions he saw on death row.

The prisoners lived in constant dread of execution, he told IPS in an interview.

“A passing guard only has to cast a glance at their cell number and they fear they have been singled out for execution,” he said. “At night every prisoner wedges a piece of wood behind their cell door so they are woken up with a noise if a guard enters while they are sleeping.

“There’s a form of state terrorism there on death row which is worse than death itself,” he said.

During his years behind bars in the Essaouira (South) prison, Dayf said he met death row prisoners who insisted they were innocent.

“The police are not investigating their alleged crimes properly and they are often using violence to extract confessions,” he said.

Many among the younger generation in Morocco appear to agree with Dayf that the death penalty should be abolished – and are also willing to express their views to the press.

“The death penalty is a barbaric punishment,” Zohra Sidki, studying for her degree in literature at the Hassan II University in Casablanca, told IPS. “The only reason for retaining it would be if it could be shown it deterred crime.”

Adam Daoud, a student in communications at the same university, was even more explicit. “The death penalty is inhumane and should be abolished whatever the crime. The right to life is a fundamental principle.”

But among the older, devout Muslims, resistance to abolition remains.

The death penalty for many is enshrined in Islamic law which cannot be questioned.

“A murderer must be executed. I know I will shock some by saying this. But this is the word of Allah,” Mohamed Larbi el-Hayouli, a schoolmaster, told IPS.

Such people look up to the Moroccan King as both their head of state and religious leader, a direct descendant of the Prophet. They expect him to defend a punishment which they believe is divine law.