HIBAPRESS – Rabat
The National Association of Media and Publishers demanded today, Thursday, the disclosure of the list of beneficiaries of public support from 2005 to 2025, while, in a separate context, praising the recent decision of the Constitutional Court regarding the draft law regulating the National Press Council.
This came in a statement following the meeting of the association's executive office yesterday, Wednesday, to discuss what it called the "malicious campaign targeting the National Association of Media and Publishers", and "developments in the draft law of the National Press Council in light of the recent decision of the Constitutional Court", and "supporting and sustaining the journalistic enterprise". After reciting the Fatiha as a prayer for the souls of the deceased colleagues Najib Al-Salmi and Hasna Boufoulja, the president of the association, Idris Chahtane, delivered, according to the statement, a presentation in which he recalled the association's journey since its founding and what it has achieved in terms of goals and achievements that exceeded expectations, as it saved the sector from certain death and enabled it to overcome the existential crisis represented by the Covid-19 pandemic, and its repercussions to this day. The President of the association added that "the association has a clear and integrated future vision that aims to structure the journalistic enterprise so that it ultimately relies on itself and its own resources, through a deep reform of the press and media system as a whole, starting from the qualification of human resources in terms of their working conditions and training, without neglecting their material condition and going through a review of the tasks and structures of the National Press Council, then addressing the major issues related to financial balances and the economic model of the enterprise, including dealing with giant digital companies and global platforms and advertising." Chahtane addressed the "reform of sports journalism and the severing of the logic of recklessness and rent-seeking", stressing that "these workshops have been launched, in coordination with the concerned public authorities, who saw in our association the serious and credible interlocutor to develop a road map that took into account the specificity of each enterprise, large, medium and small, whether paper or electronic, regional or national." He added in this context that "some parties, and they are few, preferred to stir up trouble and harnessed all legitimate and illegitimate capabilities to abort this project, using cheap methods of illegal leaks and temporary convergence of interests with political actors who saw in this file, which is originally sectoral, exclusively related to the future of the journalism professions, an opportunity to achieve electoral gains in populist ways." The president of the National Association of Media and Publishers added that "the best proof of this is what came on the lips of the head of a political party in a general session in the respected House of Representatives, in which he included the president of the association and its members after calling them "media factions", while the National Association of Media and Publishers has always taken a distance between the political parties because it includes in its ranks all segments of the press, including the independent, partisan and regional ones, and others, as it considers itself the fourth authority and therefore it is not reasonable to take a party or authority as an adversary, but on the contrary, it aims to integrate with the political scene and seeks to develop the political sense of society." As for the law regulating the National Press Council, which the Constitutional Court declared unconstitutional for some paragraphs of some of its articles, Chahtane praised the aforementioned decision and pointed out that the association "does not position itself as a winner or loser, but as an actor who sees that the decision of the Constitutional Court did not reconsider the essential matters that we defend, such as membership in the council, but rather we appreciate this decision, even if its consequences will disrupt the renewal of its members, and therefore the council will remain paralyzed at least until the parliamentary session in April 2026, and perhaps more, while there are urgent issues that must be addressed, such as renewing press cards and the train and the work of other committees such as ethics and arbitration, and others." Regarding the issue of public support for the journalistic enterprise, the president of the association presented "several options, including asking the Supreme Audit Council to reveal the list of beneficiaries of support from 2005 to 2025 and its fate and its repercussions on the media platforms and who are the real beneficiaries of the support until full transparency is achieved." After an extensive discussion in which most of the members of the association spoke, the members praised "the dedication of the leadership and its diligent work and its sacrifices for the defense of the media enterprise and praised its initiatives and the well-known works that it has been doing since taking responsibility, with selflessness and preference that is rare. They were testimonials full of appreciation and gratitude from all those involved, asking to continue the path for the benefit of the profession and professionals." The members of the association expressed their great astonishment at "the foul language that came during the intervention of the head of a political party inside the Parliament building against the members and president of the association, in a general session broadcast on the waves of radio and television, which requires severe condemnation, declaring that it will not be drawn into the maze of the purpose of which is to create "buzz" and incite public opinion against it in order to polish the image, serving an electoral agenda".
