Rabat (m&c) – Morocco’s first Islamist Prime Minister Abdelilah Benkirane presented his cabinet Tuesday, giving several key posts to his Justice and Development Party (PJD).
King Mohammed VI formally appointed the cabinet members, the official news agency MAP reported.
Benkirane, who took a resounding victory in the November 25 elections, formed a coalition government with previous premier Abbas el-Fassi’s nationalist party Istiqlal, the centrist Popular Movement and the formerly communist Progress and Socialism Party.
Leading PJD politician Saad-Eddine el-Othmani, a psychiatrist by trade, was appointed foreign minister, while Istiqlal member Nizar Baraka became finance minister.
Baraka – a former general affairs minister – informally advised el-Fassi on economic affairs.
He was not expected to introduce major changes into Morocco’s economic policy, where el-Fassi had presided over an average 3-per-cent annual growth, regarded as a relatively good performance during the global crisis.
The interior portfolio went to centrist Mohand Laenser, while PJD member Abdellah Baha was appointed minister of state, equivalent to being deputy premier.
The new justice minister is Mustapha Ramid, an Islamist lawyer whose appointment was initially opposed by the royal palace, according to media reports.
Ramid has defended Islamist terrorist suspects, has been active in regime-critical human rights organizations, criticized the security services, and is known to sympathize with the February 20 pro-democracy protest movement.
The new government includes one female minister, Bassima Hakkaoui, of the PJD, who heads the ministry of solidarity, women, family and social development.
The elections were held nearly a year ahead of schedule, in response to Arab Spring protests, which were spreading in the North African kingdom.
They followed a referendum endorsing a new constitution aimed at boosting the powers of the government and parliament at the expense of those of the king.
Mohammed VI reportedly dislikes the Islamists, but the constitution obliged him to appoint Benkirane prime minister after the PJD took 107 of 395 seats in parliament.
The new constitution was also due to reduce royal interference in the choice of other key ministers.
The PJD’s victory was the second for a moderate Islamist party in democratic elections in North Africa, after popular uprisings toppled the rulers of Egypt, Libya and Tunisia – where the Islamist Ennahda party won the country’s first free elections and is part of the new coalition government.
The PJD was not expected to impose sweeping fundamentalist reforms in Morocco, a liberal Arab country and long-time ally of the West.
