Where could we begin to define relations between Morocco and France? In terms of macroeconomic exchanges, France ranks first in stock and in average net flows. Morocco remains France’s leading African trading partner with trade up sharply and it is also the leading beneficiary of funding from the French Development Agency. Culture and education? The AEFE network in Morocco is by far the densest, with no less than 45 establishments alongside 12 cultural institutes. The diaspora of the two countries? In terms of financial transfers from Moroccans residing in France and tourist stays, Paris remains at a good distance in first position. The spectrum of the relationship is therefore so vast, so deep, that the numbers become mute.
However, this same relationship is diplomatically seized up, strategically sluggish. It suffers from irritants, to use diplomatic grammar, that the historic Franco-Moroccan partnership must neutralize. The stability of the western Mediterranean is at stake.
It is not a question here of speculating on the possibility of a break between the two bodies of the Mediterranean, because that is quite simply unrealistic as the multiple links woven between these two countries for so long are firmly anchored, and because geographical proximity imposes constraints that cannot be ignored. On the contrary, it is a matter of establishing an observation that should encourage action in a context of activism by emerging powers in the region. So now is the time to build a new material substrate on which the relationship can be based and to find its political translation within the framework of a common agenda.
The current state of the world cannot leave two strong players from both shores of the Mediterranean indifferent. The war in Ukraine, and long before that, the pandemic, revealed the weaknesses of key industries in Europe and Africa’s delays in its food and health sovereignty.
Faced with heightened competition which is in the process of reconfiguring the major commercial, industrial and energy balances, we, French and Moroccans, Africans and Europeans, must also take into account what will be the seeds of new alliances: energy, agriculture and information. The composition of the geopolitical alliances that will be the driving forces of change in the relationship also involves elements such as the sense of responsibility, the ability to take risks, to get rid of the weight of the past. So many motivations for action that go beyond the ideal framework of the calculation of costs and benefits, and which forcefully open up a time for decision-making in a restricted space of alliances for Africa and Europe.
We do not intend to resolve this vast question in a few lines; nevertheless, priority areas of work can be identified between the two States. Beyond culture and security, which are two constants of a centuries-old relationship, in terms of energy which today represents the Achilles’ heel of the liberal economies of the North, the partnership of the future does not require than audacity to be implemented. In the coming political phase, the resolution of the energy crisis and the reduction of inequalities cannot be dissociated. In Europe, the energy crisis is unprecedented and could put a stop to part of its industrial tool while the exit from fossil fuels is gradually imposing itself in the debate as the condition for the success of the ecological transition. However, the Twenty-Seven are still reluctant to look south for green energy supplies.
Morocco, a country that enjoys a special partnership with the EU, can be the ideal pillar because it has space, regular wind corridors, unparalleled sunshine and geographical proximity. Beyond the review of Europe’s energy policy, this is a requirement weighing on all of the Union’s external actions to imagine the future partnership with the South and more particularly the Morocco. France must be the bridgehead of this European paradigm shift.
African food security is another aspect of future cooperation. Morocco is the leading African exporter of phosphate inputs and its agricultural diplomacy is welcomed on the continent. France, for its part, is the leading European agricultural power and is home to the most cutting-edge research institutes in the world. The two States can work closely to guarantee Africa on the one hand food sovereignty and, on the other hand, an ability to feed Europe, which will face a saturation of arable land.
From the point of view of information, which remains intimately linked to the security dimension, our two countries are interdependent in their capacity to guarantee sovereignty and peace within their borders and beyond. France can rely on the kingdom, a large Sunni country, resolutely determined to reduce the Iranian influence of the Ayatollahs, particularly on the confessional level, which wants to expand in North Africa and a fortiori south of the Sahara. Iran, which today delivers war material to a destabilizing Russian state in the Sahel and which threatens French interests via proxies, taking advantage of the weakness of a few states. From this point of view, Morocco and France must remain unfailingly linked around this struggle for influence and information because they are facing a two-headed hydra.
It is also a question intimately linked to the challenge of development. France, as a European geopolitical actor, will have to strive to replace the doctrine of the rich economies of the North, based on the primarily economic approach, by an approach guided by the construction of peace and partnership balance with actors emerging Africans. Morocco, for its part, must renew its economic diplomacy in depth and strengthen its migration policy because the country will become, in the medium term, a land of welcome more than a passage to the Strait of Gibraltar. Here too, the Franco-Moroccan couple has many possibilities for cooperation and regional stabilization capacity.
The Franco-Moroccan couple cannot settle for a traditional bilateral relationship. When the Treaty of Saint-Germain-en-Laye was signed in 1682 between Sultan Moulay Ismaël and Louis XIV, it was, for Morocco, more than a treaty of friendship, one of the most structuring diplomatic agreements. of its relationship with Europe. We are therefore talking here about a relationship that is more than four centuries old and which has survived countless crises. So today, we must seize this geopolitical moment to take concerted action and respond to the health, environmental and security challenges to come. Will Emmanuel Macron be able to raise this subject during his first state visit to Rabat?
