Samir Bennis
Morocco World News
New York, June 24, 2011
While transitions in Tunisia and Egypt are proving bumpy and the protests in Libya, Syria, Yemen and Bahrain are being crashed bloodily, Morocco’s new draft constitution, announced by King Mohammed VI last weekend “offers a timely glimmer of the potential upside in this tumultuous year”, according to an opinion piece published on Friday in the Wall Street Journal.
“The Maghreb state’s ruler, King Mohammed VI, responded to demands for democracy with political reform, not tear gas and bullets”, added the New York-based newspaper.
While underscoring that the reforms “fall well short of full democracy” and do not live up to the demands of the February 20 movement for a parliamentary democracy with a more symbolic role for the monarch, the paper stressed that Moroccans “could set a favorable example for the rest of North Africa and the Middle East” if they seize the opportunity of the reforms announced by the King Mohamed IV in his speech.
“Such an invitation to fix the system from within should be seized, added the Wall Street Journal.
The US paper commended the path chosen by Morocco’s leadership to shift smoothly toward a democratic system, empathizing that revolution ends often badly. “Revolution may seem the glorious path, but more often than not it ends badly, noted the Wall Street Journal, adding that, the experience of the past three decades (South Korea, Chile, Central Europe, South Africa) “shows that democracies emerge more readily and stronger through negotiation”.
“This evolutionary process requires enlightened leadership and opposition that sees compromise as a virtue and shuns bloodshed”, add the paper.
