Aboubakr Jamai directed the Journal Hebdomadaire in Morocco before being forced into exile because of censorship. After a stay in the United States and Spain, he lives in Aix-en-Provence where he directs the relations program studies at the American University Institute (IAU College).

LE FIGARO. – Who is behind the boycott campaign against Booba?

ABOUBAKR NEVER. – I have doubts about the real extent of this boycott campaign, which supposedly led the authorities to cancel the concert. This deserves a thorough investigation. According to my information, this popular revenge has been greatly amplified by the Moorishs, a very pro-regime Twitter group with 51K followers. They present themselves as ultra-patriots and nationalists, and as such, regularly attack independent journalists, defenders of human rights, under the pretext of defending the monarchy.

So the Booba affair is not necessarily indicative of what Moroccan society thinks?

I don’t read the Booba boycott as religious conservatism. It is rather the mirror of an ultra-patriotic atmosphere, which serves to hide the flaws in the governance of the Moroccan regime. There has been a rather deleterious atmosphere vis-à-vis the rest of the world in Morocco lately… It is always easier to point the finger at the external enemy when you have yourself to blame yourself for. Myself, a popular Moroccan website accused me of being a French agent in a pseudo-investigation, accusing me of “bashing Moroccan diplomatic action” for interviews at RFI and France 24.

In any event, it is difficult to identify the overall trend of Moroccan opinion. Since the 1980s, the country has experienced a seismic demographic evolution. Her fertility rate in Rabat has become, in forty years, the same as in Paris or Madrid! However, the shorter the phase of demographic change, the greater the shock between generations. Add to that access to a globalized culture that exposes youth to what is happening elsewhere, and you have huge gulfs in terms of values ​​between two or three successive generations. So, even if polls show that young Moroccans are more and more religious, I am hesitant to say that the youth is against Booba. If so, how to explain his huge success at the 2017 concert at the Mawazine festival?

The Islamist opposition Justice and Development (PJD) party wrote a letter to the government asking for the concert to be canceled. Is there therefore no connection with religious rigor?

I don’t think religion is the driving force. The PJD has lost its popular credit. After having been in government for two successive legislatures, he was soundly beaten in the last legislative elections two years ago. (A very surprising result, however, with a loss of 90% of its elected municipal officials, which makes no sense for local elections. I am convinced that the State played a role in this).

In short, the victory they experienced in 2013 was due to the wave of Arab springs, on the one hand because the regime had to let the electoral game take place in a slightly more transparent manner than usual, and because in political offer at the time, the PJD was the party closest to the values ​​of the Arab Spring. But the vote of Moroccans was not Islamist. It was rather a request for honesty, righteousness, democracy.

Is there then an element of anti-Western, even anti-French sentiment in the decision to cancel Booba?

There is undeniably a kind of primary anti-French ultra-nationalism in Morocco, but the cancellation of Booba does not necessarily fit into this framework. Already because he himself is not always kind to France… The case is more like that of Brahim Bouhlel. This French comedian was sentenced to eight months in prison in 2021 in Morocco because of a video in which he insulted young children. It was the same kind: a kind of exacerbated Arab nationalism, inflamed by the same Moorish group. How are these kinds of events hyped up? This deserves an investigation, but given the systematically pro-regime campaigns that the Moorish defend, especially on the question of Western Sahara, one would surely find behind state-funded troll farms.

All that we know of Booba is that the cancellation was recorded on a decision of the wilaya of Casablanca. This territorial authority depends directly on the Ministry of the Interior. So it was the government that banned the concert. The insults vis-à-vis Moroccan women for which the singer is accused are not glorious, but if the State has responded to boycott campaigns, it is because it wants above all to show itself as a defender of the honor of the country. and national values.