By Ahmed Jalali
Whiَle King Mohammed VI was chairing a Council of Ministers in Rabat, which
included decisions that could be considered a response to the reasonable
demands chanted and called for by “Gen Z” in the name of the vast
majority of the Moroccan people, other young Moroccans in the heart of Latin
America were struggling to achieve the impossible: winning the Youth World Cup
in an adventure that reached the depths of a sporting and national epic.
And when you just contemplate the football legends (Brazil, Spain, France,
Argentina) that the Atlas Lions’ Cubs overcame, you cannot pass it off as
something ordinary… No, it is not ordinary at all; it is a miracle. More
importantly than the description is the search for a logically and rationally
convincing explanation.
The coach is Moroccan, the plan is Moroccan, and the Mohammed VI Football
Academy is Moroccan… so the Cup was Moroccan. To hell with everything foreign
in our management and in dictating any “philosophy” to us.
These young men created this miracle, in addition to the fully Moroccan
context, because they have enough self-confidence and are not afraid of
ambition in its most erratic and crazy limits. Simply put, this is a generation
unlike its hesitant Moroccan predecessors, the half-ambitious, the quarter-dreamers.
These big little ones are practical, dreamers, and work hard to achieve the
dream.
Even in their joy (when receiving the medals, for example), they seemed like
someone who was confident of victory and convinced that they were the best.
These heroes resemble us as Moroccans but are very different from us in
temperament and composure.
The very beautiful thing about this great victory, symbolically and
psychologically, is its timing: our boys won the World Cup in an Arab and
regional context suffering from disappointments, defeats, and setbacks… so
the psychological victory became shared and a right for the inhabitants of the
Arab region from one end to the other.
The sons of the Amazigh people , who
inherited Arabism and Islam as a historical boon of generosity, are happy for
their people and share their happiness with the rest of the peoples with whom
they share the bonds of religion, culture, and common history. This is the
healthy Moroccan exception.
After the frenzy of enthusiasm and the justifiable hysterical joy of a great
victory subsides, calm sets in, and you reflect with yourself or out loud with
a compatriot you are comfortable with, and you see the amazing paradoxes of a
Morocco that is moving at more than one speed:
·
You foolishly and
delightfully ask yourself: Since Morocco is capable of all these sporting
victories and successes, what prevents achieving similar ones in other areas
that are closely linked to the daily life of the citizen who suffers woes in
their health, finances, work, and with the administration?
·
Then you become even more
astonished when you see Fouzi Lekjaa, for example, with his sporting prestige
and power, and you wonder—this time with bitter anger—and want to know what has
stopped the springs of success in the financial aspect connected to the
government budget? Since the man has a successful mind that made the national
team challenge giants, why doesn’t Lekjaa’s genius come up with solutions to
save the bankrupts of this nation by rationalizing the collection, investment,
and distribution of money… and you get a headache in both your temples.
·
And as you watch the youth
raise the golden cup to see it in the sky of Santiago, you must consider how
you can explain to the world that the Moroccan people whose sons create this
great magic have shantytowns that make officials ashamed, and ugliness in poor
medical services and inhumane treatment in various facilities, and corruption
and graft with a stench worse than the most horrific forms of pus and
discharge.
·
And when you marvel at how
these golden adolescents achieved this universal triumph, a more dangerous
question sparks in your mind: What if every Moroccan was given the opportunity
to show what they have to offer, in all fields, and the criterion was truly
equal opportunity? I swear, if this happened, it would only take ten years and
we would look down on Spain and France.
Since the arrival of this ill-fated government, Moroccans have gone from one
setback to another, from a collective ordeal to a greater catastrophe. The few
displays of joy, like distant flashes of light in spacetime, were only created
by Moroccan sports youth or by royal decisions that alleviate some of the
burden on the people (such as canceling the Eid sacrifice).
It is one of the paradoxes of the beautiful Moroccan sports era that God has
given us Wahbi in sports (the coach), who temporarily made us forget the colic
caused by the government’s Wahbi throughout these heavy years of the Akhannouch
government.
The event of winning the Youth World Cup in this epic manner and with this
legendary determination transcends sports to something more serious, despite
its importance. It is a clear indicator of the possible Morocco, or rather the
Morocco that should be in the foreseeable future.
These golden sons of Morocco, along with the youth of Gen Z, are the outcry
that must and should awaken the sleepers and make those who are deafened by the
desire for monopoly and moving against the tide of history hear.
While the euphoria of victory and the historical increase in allocations for
health, education, and employment in the 2026 budget will somewhat ease the
social tension boiling in the Moroccan pot, this must be conditional on
fundamental rules; otherwise, it is playing with fire and heading straight
towards a solid rock:
·
First, arresting and
prosecuting the plunderers of all sectors, including education and health,
holding them accountable, and reclaiming the funds from them by law, and not
just Lekjaa’s diligence in expanding the tax base through painful increases or
decisions targeting “those who can be managed.”
·
Second, the billions
allocated for health and education must ensure that seven-tenths of it are
spent where the citizen should feel a direct benefit from it, not just going to
management… and so on and so forth, achieving nothing in the end.
·
The dozens of university
hospitals and others that they promised us: Will citizens find treatment in
them, or will they be content with modern buildings and relatively comfortable
chairs? Moroccans want real emergency rooms, medical staff to provide immediate
relief, and medication that is available and reasonably priced. Furthermore,
how are “RAMED,” “AMO,” and the whole bunch of names, and what
is their share of all these inflated figures?
·
More important than the
current decisions and the reaffirmation of the social state is that the state
has correctly caught the signals, believed in the importance of self-criticism,
and genuinely decided to wage a relentless war on corruption, and thus change
the governance methodology. In the end, governance is a philosophy and a
conception, and the people of logic said that judging a thing is a branch of
its conception.
Yesterday, I read a post that both delighted and pained me for its
cleverness, well-chosen words, and power of expression and brevity:
“Removing the hands of the corrupt from public funds is more important
than raising budgets.” Clear?
The social, political, sporting, and scientific Gen Z is a blessing from God
that emerged from the loins of Moroccans, and they are destiny’s reward to
Moroccans. In return, they deserve a reward from the state and the people: to
embrace them, empower them, and grant them every opportunity to be the new
blood that revives the state’s arteries and strengthens the institutions.
Embrace them and do not fear them, for they are your sons and daughters, not
an enemy to be wary of.
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