Morocco – Class is
in Session!
Marrakesh, the party town, is
supposedly the top tourist site in Africa. Rabat
is the old imperial capital of the country, and is still the quieter seat of
government. Fes
has a large ancient medina that you could get lost in for days. Casablanca
is the Moroccan version of Marseille – all business and work. And Ricks’ Café still exists there! What is not to like?
Going to another country is an immersive education, and Morocco is no
different. Of course, what you learn
might not be on the curriculum. A colony
of the French for many years, a benevolent capitalist monarchy at present, a
Muslim country not suffering from inter-Islamic warfare or the worst of
intolerance. The Turks never got there,
which is why there is no crescent on their flag, just a green star on a red
background, changed by the French. Before that it was plain red. It was relayed to us that Sultan Mohammed V,
the first king of the newly independent nation, greeted the Nazis with a yellow
star on his jilaba. Sephardic Jews have
a long history in this nation, but they were 'attacked' after the 1948 war, and
the overwhelming majority left for Israel after the Israeli wars. Some allege that the Mossad organized the
attacks to herd Jewish people into Israel. There
are now almost 1 million Moroccan Jews living in Israel. Their old quarters, the ‘mellah,’ still remain in
the older parts of Marrakesh and Fes.
Because the Turks never got there, because Jews were
numerous for many years, because there was and still is a strong European
influence (being so close to Spain)
and because the indigenous Amazigh people (Berbers to you) are now 40% of the
population, Morocco
never became a typical Islamic nation. Women
wear hijabs – or they don’t, if they don’t want to. French is the country’s second language, and
the primary language in many newspapers, politics and in education. Food is Moroccan – tangine stews, fresh
fruits, vegetables and fish, couscous, meze salads, avocado smoothies – and also
French - patisseries, breads and other culinary influences. Kif (a form of hashish) is one of their
illegal yet profitable major exports, directly through Tangiers to Spain and the rest of Europe. It is an overwhelmingly agricultural country,
whose northern quarter is like the Imperial Valley of California – not desert
at all. The people are for the most part
laid-back. What is not to like?
I’m not a tour director, so I’ll put on my Marxist X-Ray
specs and see. Tour directors are not
allowed to actually tell you the whole story, but I will. Journey into the labyrinth of the northern
souks of Marrakesh,
just above the famous rock and roll of the Djemaa-el-Fna square (above). Look at all the young men sitting in front of
their endless stalls – selling very little.
Look at all the young men sitting in the endless cafes of every city,
sipping mint tea and strong coffees, chatting with their friends. Look at the all the young and old men
standing around their rural towns, or any town, with nothing to do. Look at all the young men doing marginal
selling jobs, as touts, dealers, stall minders, salesmen, haphazard cabbies and
guides – or nothing at all. Unemployment is
supposedly 9.5% but that figure is as unreliable as our own jiggered
unemployment rates. The precariat is
certainly visible. The bazaar-based
peti-bourgeois ‘businessman’ is everywhere.
Where is the proletariat? To the
tourist, they are mostly hidden. Yet who
makes all this stuff? They are many
times female.
Take the blowhard selling rugs. “Men sell and women work,” is his slogan. She smiles behind the loom. She has no choice. The mosque has separations between the women
and the men, with the women relegated to the upstairs or the back, so as not to
‘tempt’ the men before god. And what about
the women? Are they not tempted, looking down on so many men and their imam? Perhaps not.
There are few women in the cafes. They are mostly hidden at tourist
hotels drinking tea with a friend, where they wear no hijab. Yet there are almost none in the public
cafes. They are in the grocery stores
and at home, cooking, taking care of the children, cleaning the home while Mohammad
smokes and drinks tea. I saw women on
scooters, going somewhere. But not
hanging out. Perhaps the cafes need to
be integrated?
The pushy rug man has too many rugs, which he never sells,
yet he does not come down in price. The
quiet wholesaler admits he has too many rugs –stacks to the ceiling. Overproduction is the term. The stalls are full of crap that never gets
sold, that sits for years. Chinese,
Moroccan, from anywhere. Not that this is
that different from so many small businesses all over the world, even in the U.S. Too many rugs, not enough money. Traditional designs that no one wants. Too much stuff, in an economy that only has
one point - to turn out more and more commodities, to commodify everything in sight. It is wasting the talents of millions of
unemployed Moroccans.
The term ‘Islamic Art’ is an oxymoron – a contradiction that
screams static. Traditional ‘Islamic”
designs on pottery and rugs are made up of mathematical designs, completely
symmetrical floral patterns, absent any human face or figure, or representation
of reality – except the ‘hand of Fatima.’ Fatima was Muhammed’s favorite wife. He had
several wives, just like the Mormons and the Christian prophets too, and she
alone seems to have made the grade because she first bore him a son. Right on Fatima, a son.
Static design sends a message that the world does not change. It is circular. It repeats.
It is not dialectical. It cannot vary. Nor is it human even. It can be done with a protractor, by machine. Yet it is mostly done by hand. Just this one hand gets out...
The Amazigh, by contrast, have some freedom in their
designs, in their arts. They are a
darker people from the desert and mountains who used to rule Morocco, and
then adopted Allah. They are poorer as a
strata, do much of the manual and hand agricultural labor, and were called “Berbers.” The
term is a derivative of the word ‘barbarian’ – i.e. Berber is an insult. Amazigh are oppressed in most nations in
North Africa, but in Morocco
they are treated better than most, perhaps due to their numbers. However, their language and autonomy are
still at issue, and the Moroccan left makes that a cause.
Muhammed was a businessman. The religion of Islam seems
to be based on the rule of a pre-capitalist trading / merchant strata that united
tribes and seized power in what became Saudi Arabia. He was not a carpenter. Nor did he get crucified – he destroyed pagan
idols instead. To this day, Islam is not
a proletarian ideology but one of the medinas – the shop areas – the small
businessman. Yet as the 5 calls to
prayer a day (!!!) are sung out by the muezzin, very few head to the omnipresent minarets
or plop on clean rugs to pray. Minarets
are scattered around the city and in Marrakesh
no building is allowed to be higher than the tallest mosque's minaret. At one pottery factory where about 20 worked
only two workers headed to the prayer room.
Just like the U.S.,
the number that actually show up at church is a minority of the ‘god’
believing. I heard muezzin at 4 in the
morning, which should give you an indication of why any working person trying
to get a good nights sleep might question this practice.
Morocco
is ruled by a paternalistic king – Mohammed VI - who has palaces in 4 ‘royal’
cities. He’s married to an educated
woman. He is installing a massive solar
array in the desert that will provide much electricity to the country. The government is banning plastic bags as a
curse. Morocco borrowed some ‘mixed
economy’ ideas from the French and their own history. Phosphates – which are the most valuable
export – are owned by the government, not private individuals or
corporations. The largest cell-phone
company is a third-owned by the government.
People cannot be evicted easily if they cannot pay for new lodgings – it
can take years to remove them. Oil is
public property if discovered, as are other minerals and ground
substances.
Yet privatization is also proceeding apace. The main freeways are toll roads owned by
private companies, which got help building them with public funds. Morocco advertises itself as a
great ‘off-shoring’ destination for European corporations – a sweatshop at
their doorstep so to speak. Capital
rules the country through the king.
The king is the ultimate ruler over the constituent
assembly, the military, foreign policy, and also a ‘commander of the faithful’
– which means he is a direct descendent of the ‘prophet Muhammed.’ Right.
A socialist coalition was influential from 1998 until 2002, but still
the King held ultimate power. Communists
were heavily repressed in the 1970s – under King Hassan II thousands of
militants were given 10-year sentences, while others were disappeared. People pretend that all present arrests are
of fundamentalist Islamic terrorists, but the government also arrests
leftists demanding real democracy. Morocco
still rules over their very own colonial possession – the Southwest
Sahara and the Sahrawi people.
The Moroccan Army defeated the Polasario Liberation Front in the Southwest
Sahara many years ago and continue their military presence
there. Morocco is not a democracy, as much
as the King wants tourists and his best friends Clinton and Obama to believe it. Many
radicals in the kingdom make that point.
The apologists say that Moroccans are ‘not ready’ for democracy. King George might have said the same about the American rabble. Yet
they have many parties and a parliament.
I think it is the King that is not ‘ready' for democracy.
Pardon Americans for being stunned, but the U.S. got rid of
kings 250 years ago. Very few nations
have them anymore – they are sort of like the crazy uncle in the closet.
Down with Kings and Money!
Salaam Alaikum!
Red Frog
March 17, 2014
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