HIBAPRESS
The presentation of the government program by Fatima Zahra Mansouri, the new head of government, before Parliament on Monday afternoon was not merely an announcement of the priorities for the upcoming phase. It also served as an occasion to compare the promises made during the electoral campaign of the Authenticity and Modernity Party (PAM) with the choices included in the program on which the new majority will operate.
Through the program's contents, a clear trend emerged towards continuing the projects launched by the previous government, whether related to social protection, health and education reform, investment promotion, or the development of basic infrastructure. These are files that remained at the core of government work during the past term, and indications from the new program confirm that their completion will remain a fundamental part of the current government's agenda.
However, this trend raises a political question that goes beyond the issue of public program continuity: What will Mansouri's government add to what the previous government started? And where will the features of changing course, which was one of the slogans promoted by the PAM during the electoral elections, be manifested?
In this context, the reliance on the new development model and the ambition of Morocco 2035, as emphasized by Mansouri in her presentation, reflects continued work within the same strategic framework adopted by the previous government. This choice can ensure the continuity of reforms, but it makes it necessary to clarify the elements that will give the new program its distinctiveness, whether in terms of priorities, implementation methods, or expected results, which Mansouri is doing.
On the other hand, electoral promises that did not appear in the program with the same clarity raise additional questions, especially the commitment to create one million net jobs during the government's term, reduce taxes on wages, and bring the prices of basic commodities back to their normal levels. These commitments were part of the electoral discourse, and citizens expected to find precise clarifications on how they would be implemented and the timeline for their achievement. However, Mansouri presented them in her government program in a vague manner and without numerical indicators.
According to many critics of Mansouri's governmental statement, this is not about demanding the abandonment of the previous government's projects simply because they were launched under a different majority, especially since many of them were successful and formed a source of national consensus, including those related to the major project of the social state. Rather, it is related to the slogan that Mansouri and her party raised during the election campaign, which was about changing course. However, the government program she presented today confirms that she is continuing on the same course set by the previous government, whether in health, education, social support, housing, investment, water, energy, or infrastructure related to the World Cup.
