« L’Escale du Maroc »; promoting the image of Morocco

« L’Escale du Maroc », this was the first and last exposition that took place in Paris (2003), seeking the promotion of Morocco abroad under the organizational effort of Mohammed Abbadi. This man, who had lived in France as an emigrant worker for three decades, had voluntarily organized this event in order to promote the image of morocco (or the Moroccans implicitly) for the rest of the world. This event and organization came to its end as soon as Mohammed retired and decided to come back to his mother country, Morocco. In one of his articles, Mohammed claimed that he didn't get enough support from the Moroccan government; so how can we consider M. Abbadi as the Moroccan Karen Hughes although this later was enjoying a generous salary and position provided by the American government, while the former had voluntarily and for free served his country, to be dumped by the end.

It is true that some might argue that Morocco has many other priorities on its agenda rather than promoting its image, but I would say that it is not a valid argument. Personally, I think that Morocco must take this issue as a serious consideration for two valid reasons: first, having a good image will serve all Moroccans but the immigrants to a great extent; those poor Moroccans who face humiliation and underestimation everyday could improve their situation if their government cares for them. In addition, this category of Moroccans is one of the major sources of funds to this country, statistics had provided that this segment brought a 36 million Dhs of foreign currency to morocco in 2006(about 10% from the national GDP); therefore, based either on the humanitarian or neoliberal perspective, this segment of Moroccans should receive a greater amount of care. The second argument that makes the polishing of Morocco's image aboard a necessity is that it will bring more tourists and foreign investors. Given the fact that the second most important sector in the Moroccan economy and the first on the king's agenda is tourism, promoting the image of this country should be held as the first national priority, and shouldn't be a government’s task only but everybody's duty.

the 3 strategic goals of the American public deplomacy are:

• enhancing american values abroad
• sharing american history with the world
• enhancing a good image of the USA

why Morocco is lagging behind?

I think that the main reason behind the fact that morocco is lagging behind mainly at the level of education because it had adopted the French model blindly. As it is the case of all our governmental institutions, policies and regulations, Morocco is applying the French model of education but the problem is that the French government had renewed and changed its model that Morocco is still using. So one of the recommendations is that Morocco has to develop its own educational system, and if it is welling to be based on some models, it is better to use ones of countries that are really doing well at that level such as Germany, South Korea and US; and this will be easier for Morocco to adopt because it is the short cat since France itself is getting influenced by those countries especially when talking about education. Keeping in mind that decision makers have to use some of the critical thinking and try to apply those models to the Moroccan/Islam/Arab context.

Trevor Dougherty is not just a kid, he is the man himself

Dear fellers,
When I saw the article about this young kid and how he was successful to make such an achievement toward a world peace, i found my self gallous. Not only this time but every time when I see a western or a non-Arab in general make an invention or at least use an existing invention to serve the humanity, i keep asking my self why not us?
We have almost the same access to technology, but why we are not at that level of creativity, is it related to our genes and our status of being Arabs, definitely not?
this was only a joke, and the best prove that the lack of creativity that the Arab world is facing nowadays is not related to genes matter is that the best inventor in the beginning of the history were Arabs; so the reaming factor to which we can link this underdevelopment is related to us, the way of thinking and the way of teaching our kids, and the best example is the Moroccan education system and no offence!

best regards coming to your way
harit

Digital visionary: Nicholas Negroponte

Providing computers at a symbolic price of 100$ is very attractive; however, from a Moroccan perspective, even such a low price can be unaffordable or use less. in a country where illiteracy has very long roots, by literacy here i mean being able to read and write, selling computers to children or given them for free seems useless. As Dr. Ibahrane told us this morning, it will be better to invest our effort to teach kids in rural areas the minimum so that they would be able to perform well in agriculture. Such a strategy, of giving PCs at a symbolic price, can be helpful in a community where IT had becoming part of their culture such as china and India; however, morocco and Moroccans have some prior needs than owning a personal computer, such as food, health care and elementary education.

Abbas Al fassi

It's been announced today that Abbas al-Fassi, the leader of the Istiqlal party (made up of a bunch of rich and influential businessmen and landowners, close to the palace, who describe themselves as conservatives and 'nationalists,' and who came first in last september 7th legislative elections) has been chosen by the King of Morocco to lead the next government.

Al-Fassi and his party are the archetype opportunistic, bootlicking politicians, with no ideological basis whatsoever, apart from the constant obsession they have for power and privilege.

Al-fassi has been a member of the outgoing government where he held a non-portfolio ministerial office. Doing what? who knows? Oh... I beg your pardon, he did achieve something when serving as minister of labor in a previous cabinet (2000-2002): His ministry was involved in a monstrous crooked deal, also known as "the An'najat affair," when tens of thousands of young poor Moroccan job seekers paid substantial amounts of money (as premium) to a fake company based in the Emirates, which promised to enroll a big number of candidates, many of whom spent their life savings to pay for the job offer. A convention has been signed at the time, with the Emirati company An'najat by the very official ANAPEC (the Moroccan job agency) under the patronage and advocacy of the then ministry of labor, ignoring warnings by many international organizations like the ITF (the International Transport Federation). At first sight, there was no reason for anybody to doubt of the competence of either Al-Fassi or the government. The whole affair was, of course, trumpeted up by al-Fassi and presented as a big personal achievement, which he used as an electoral argument during the legislative campaign of 2002.

A couple of mounts after the elections, the first cruel signs of the fraud appeared; then the 30,000 applicants were bluntly informed of the trickery and told that their dreams were definitely dashed.

So: either al-Fassi has been cheated upon and double-crossed by an impeccably executed swindle, or he knowingly participated in the con. In either accounts he disqualified as a man worth of respect, let alone trust. Has he been held to account for his crime? Nop! Because in Morocco, you only have to be a sycophant and a servile attendant of the Makhzen to escape justice and have access to power and privilege.Today's dispatch of the MAP (the Moroccan official press agency) explained that "King Mohamed VI praised Mr. al-Fassi for his 'patriotism' and for his 'commitment to the sacred values,' describing him as a 'statesman with great experience.'"

Uncle Bill's act from an economic prespective

When talking about bill gate, we should bare in mind that he is one of, or the most successful business person on the universe; therefore, such an act by offering softwares to the Chinese market for a symbolic price is a clever idea. From and ethical and social responsibility perspective, business people always face the dilemma of wether take a part of the revenues and spend it in a social responsible way, or reinvest it in the capital in order to generate further returns. In the case of bill gate, I think that he chose the first alternative by supplying a software that is usually sold at 150$ in the US for 3$. Actually we can see that this is a very successful act interms of dual care and social responsibility; as well as it can be seen as a long term investment; first, bill gate had becoming even more popular in china and all over the world after such an act; besides, from a financial perspective, selling an intangible (a software) for any price will generate a profit; in this case, Microsoft had already covered its fixed and variable costs for developing the software, so by selling the software either on CDs or online for 3$ to a huge market like the one of China, will definitely generate profit for Microsoft although with a lower margin. Finally, talking about Chinese market, we know that it is the leader of counterfeiting, so bill gate had no way but selling his product at price that is close to the one of the counterfeited product, keeping in mind that is original. Also, i think by selling the operating system for a symbolic price of 3$ is only a hook for the consumers because after buying a genuine operating system, the computer might be able to work only with genuine softwares such as antiviruses and other tools. Talking about Morocco, i can see a great similarity between this latter and the Chinese market in terms of supply and demand for the counterfeited products, so the same strategy used by Mr. Bill will be helpful in Morocco too, except for the selling price, since Moroccans can afford a higher one; keeping in mind the great difference between the minimum wage in China (50$/month) and the one in Morocco (250$/month).