HM King Mohammed VI announced, Wednesday evening, the launching of the National Initiative for Human Development, which illustrates the sovereign's concern to fulfill the aspirations of the Moroccan people, and which is part of the society project initiated by His Majesty since his accession to the Alaouite throne.
This Initiative, launched in a nationwide speech, stems from four principal benchmarks that constitute its cogency and philosophy of action, and consolidates the socio-economic building of development of the country as well as the fundamental reforms and the progress achieved as regards the strengthening of the Rule of Law.
In the first place, the Initiative stems from the objective data which show that broad fringes of the population live under difficult conditions and sometimes in a situation of poverty and marginalisation, incompatible with the conditions of a worthy and decent life that the Sovereign wishes for the citizens.
His Majesty recalls, in this respect, that many districts and shantytowns, urban or peri-urbans, and several communes, located for their great majority in rural areas, live difficult situations marked by the insufficiency of the access to equipments and basic social services.
The Royal Initiative stems, in the second place, from a conviction according to which the social upgrading cannot rely on the specific assistance or the spontaneous charity action or even on an ethical duty.
His Majesty underlines, in this regard, that the efficient and sustainable development can only be materialized by the means of integrated public policies lying within the scope of a coherent enterprise and a global project, while ensuring an all-out mobilization.
The third benchmark of the Initiative is related to the choice of His Majesty the King for the opening on the world, in view of the challenges and vulnerabilities which weaken the social and territorial bonds and convey consumption standards, ways of life and invading diagrams of thought.
Underlining the need for benefiting from many opportunity which offers the opening on the world while immunizing the assets with respect to its repercussions, the Sovereign notes that this action can be only a collective endeavor, and that all the Moroccans have to take part in it.
The Initiative stems, in the fourth place, from the lessons drawn from the past experiments and the models having proven reliable in certain countries, in such matters as the fight against poverty and exclusion.
The Sovereign notes that these experiments show that this challenge could be taken up only by one rigorous definition of the objectives and a general mobilization for their realization.
They inform, moreover, about the limit of the strictly sectorial, isolated and not integrated development approaches, and about the dysfunctions generated by the great dispersion of efforts, resources and actors. On the other hand, notes His Majesty the King, these experiments attest of the relevance of the policies targeting the most vulnerable zones and categories, as much as the importance of a participation of the populations for a better viability of the projects and interventions.
On the basis of these assets, of these reference frames and lessons drawn from the past experiments, His Majesty recalls that this Initiative must be considered under the sign of the genuine and acting citizenship, and proceed from a resolutely innovative step.
Three main axes for the methodology of action
The Sovereign set three main axes for the methodology of action in order to materialize the National Initiative for Human Development, underlining the need for tackling , first, the social deficit by the widening of the access to the basic equipment and social services, such as health, education, the elimination of illiteracy, water, electricity and the cultural infrastructures.
His Majesty the King lays the emphasis, in the second place, on the importance of the promotion of steady incomes and employment-generating activities, while adopting a more imaginative action in direction of the informal sector.
To this end, the Sovereign called the government and the various partners to make of the coming national meetings on employment an opportunity to engage an open and constructive dialogue and to make specific proposals, in order to stop the unemployment of the young people.
The third axis set by His Majesty consists in providing assistance to the people in great vulnerability, or with specific needs, to enable them free themselves from the yoke of precariousness and to preserve their dignity.
Identification of the recipients on a purely priority basis
To carry out these objectives, it was judged relevant to adopt objective criteria urgently to determine the recipients on a purely priority basis, taking into account material impossibility to ensure an exhaustive and concomitant coverage of all the areas and all the categories.
Thus, His Majesty the King announced that, in a first stage of its launching, the Initiative will target the reinforcement of the social upgrading of 360 communes among the poorest of the rural world, and of 250 poor districts, in urban and peri-urban environment, old médinas and shantytowns.
It will target, also and in a progressive way, the upgrading of both the capacities and the quality of the existing reception centers, or the creation of new specialized centers, capable of accommodating and providing assistance to the people in a situation of great precariousness.
The Sovereign underlined, in this respect, that in spite of the limited means, one should not yield to a precarious situation which is viewed as a fate by the Moroccan people, laying emphasis on the assets of the country, including the potential of creativity and qualified human resources.
Calendar of the implementation of the Royal Initiative
His Majesty the King set a calendar for implementing the Initiative on the short, medium and long terms.
On the short term, His Majesty the King entrusted the Prime Minister with making sure that the Government endeavors to give shape to this new Initiative, in its first phase, in the form of programs, integrated and tangible projects on the ground.
The Prime Minister will have to submit to the high appreciation of His Majesty the King, in the three months to come, a complete action plan answering the objectives of the Initiative.
On the medium term, His Majesty the King exhorts the political community, in the perspective of the 2007 elections, to give priority to the development of concrete projects, the goal being to give shape to this Initiative.
On the long term, the Sovereign expressed his ambition, which is also that of the people, to raise the indices of human development in our dear motherland to a level comparable with that of the developed countries.
The Royal initiative will rely on resources earmarked in the general budget of the State
Given the national character of this Initiative, His Majesty the King gave his High instructions to the Prime Minister to submit it to the Parliament at a special meeting, so that it collects all the support which it requires.
The Sovereign also invited the government to listen and engage a dialogue with all the sharp forces of the Nation, and to adopt an action plan based on the principles of good governance.
As to the financing, His Majesty the King decided that the Initiative relies on perennial resources of a substantial level, and be earmarked in the general budget of the State, underlining the need to put an end to the palliatives, sterile and transitory half-measures.
The financing of the Initiative must also be deployed according to a specific financial mechanism ready to guarantee, in addition to the viability of the resources, an efficient easing of the procedures of implementation.
His Majesty insisted, in this respect, that no recourse will be made to a new tax or fiscal burden, neither for the citizen nor for the company.
The National Initiative for Human Development, a building site of reign, permanently open
The Sovereign insisted that the National Initiative for Human Development is neither a specific project, nor a program of the circumstantial economic situation, but acts rather as a building site of reign, permanently open.
His Majesty also insisted on the fact that it does not either question the scale of the priorities, stressing the permanence of the combat carried out in upgrading the human capital, the reinforcement of the competitiveness of the national economy, and the promotion of the investment.
His Majesty the King, in this respect, underlined the determining role of the optimal implementation of the reform of the system of education and training as a capital lever of social mobility and integration, as well as the need for our country to have a strategy of action controlled in the long run by an effective rural development.
Reiterating the duty of solidarity with regard to the rural world, the Sovereign exhorted the government to take the emergency measures which are essential to overcome the current economic situation marked by a difficult agricultural year.
His Majesty the King, may God assist him, set a three year period for the evaluation of the results of this initiative, calling for the adhesion and the mobilization of all, in a spirit of abnegation and sacrifice.