Marrakesh - Politics and Administration

Politics and Administration

Further information: Subdivisions of Marrakesh Avenue Mohamed VI, where many of the major institutions of Marrakesh are located.

Marrakesh, the regional capital, forms a prefecture-level administrative unit of Morocco, divided into Marrakesh-Medina, Marrakesh-Menara and Sidi Youssef Ben Ali, which form part of the region of Marrakesh-Tensift-El Haouz along with Al Haouz Province, Chichaoua Province, El Kelâat Es-Sraghna Province, and Essaouira Province. Marrakesh is a major centre for law and jurisdiction in Morocco and most of the major courts of the region are located here. These include the regional Court of Appeal, the Commercial Court, the Administrative Court, the Court of First Instance, the Court of Appeal of Commerce, and the Administrative Court of Appeal. Numerous organizations of the region are based here including the regional government administrative offices, the Regional Council of Tourism office, and regional public maintenance organizations such as the Governed Autonomous Water Supply and Electricity and Maroc Telecom.

Testament to Marrakesh's development as a modern city, on June 12, 2009, Fatima-Zahra Mansouri, a then 33 year-old lawyer and daughter of a former assistant to the local authority chief in Marrakesh, was elected the first female mayor of the city, defeating outgoing Mayor Omar Jazouli by 54 votes to 35 in a municipal council vote. Mansouri became only the second woman in the history of Morocco to obtain a mayoral position in Morocco after Asma Chaabi, mayor of Essaouira. The Secretary General of her Authenticity and Modernity Party (PAM) Mohamed Cheikh Biadillah stated that "her election reflects the image of a modern Morocco." However, her appointment was shrouded in controversy and resulted in her temporarily losing her seat the following month after a court ruled that the election had been fixed. The court found that "some ballots were distributed before the legal date and some vote records were destroyed." Her party called for a 48-hour strike to "protest the plot against the democratic process." On 7 July 2011, Mansouri presented her resignation from the city council of Marrakesh, but reconsidered her decision the next day.

Since the legislative elections in November 2011, the ruling political party in Marrakesh has, for the first time, been the Justice and Development Party or PDJ which also rules at the national level. The party, which advocates Islamism and Islamic democracy, won five seats while the PAM won three and the National Rally of Independents or RNI, one. In the partial legislative elections for the Guéliz Ennakhil constituency in October 2012, the PDJ under the leadership of Ahmed El Moutassadik was again the winner with 10,452 votes. The PAM, consisting essentially of friends of King Mohammed VI, was in second place with 9,794 votes.