Pure Income Tax: a Rate for Everyone

I suspect lawyers got the better of economists when it comes to the proper rates that apply to Income Tax rates. income brackets are determined somewhat arbitrarily -I haven’t come across any MINEFI stating otherwise yet- and all exemptions, tax breaks, loopholes and other regulations are yet to prove their usefulness, both as a policy instrument and as an incentive to influence taxpayers’ behaviour.

As it stands now, Income tax represents 3.8% of total GNI; roughly speaking, that means every household in Morocco pays some 4.440 dirhams in taxes – which is quite absurd, since a lot of these do not pay it actually, and another bunch is getting away with it; while it is understood the poorer 10% do not pay income tax due to their very low average annual income – some 25,172 dirhams, the wealthiest 10% earn an average of 427,931 dirhams per annum. So in effect, the real average tax payment is closer to 3.97% or 5,000 dirhams per household. But even that amount of money is phony; how can one explain the high discrepancy in the 38% marginal rate, the average 3.97% and the real marginal rate of 1.16%?

The is simple: there is an incredible inequality in household income distribution, and the present tax system is intrinsically unfair, as it lays a heavier burden on the middle/median incomes relative to the higher ones, and finally, there are many wealthier individuals with Agricultural Business whose taxes are negative, i.e. subsidized in their income. Indeed, the present tax code presents (urban) taxpayers with the following rates:

<30,000 per annum: ……………exempted
[30,001 ; 50,000] per annum: ………..10%
[50,001 ; 60,000] per annum: ………..20%
[60,001 ; 80,000] per annum: ………..30%
[80,001 ; 180,000] per annum: ………34%
>180,000 per annum: ………………….38%

which does not compute with income distribution, since the actual IR rates tend to hit the middle class harder – and by middle class I mean the 75,500 dirhams these households earn annually, and many of these cannot get away with the various loopholes and breaks the tax code allows for, thus creating an actual tax break for the 38% marginal rate.

Is it possible to provide an alternative tax system then? Sure. It would have the advantage of being simple, progressive and easier to carry out, because rates would adjust themselves automatically. There is one little caveat though: the statistical evidence from income distribution has to be solid and significant. Since I do not have access to the detail, I would venture some results based on the public data HCP released regarding income distribution in 2009.

Let me first start with some doodling with some simple assumptions – just to get my point across. Let’s assume income distribution is normally distributed with the present mean 114,420 dirhams, and (sampled) deviation of 1,474. Computations are therefore easier to run with custom tax rates: depending on how far a household’s income falls from the average 114,420, they have to pay a commensurate tax rate computed with the same normal distribution; since the average income rate households in Morocco below the median threshold are supposed to pay is 7%, then we can match Normal income distribution with an equivalent Normal income tax distribution in this simple setting, the wealthier 1% with an income of 117,850 dirhams and above would pay at least 9.3% income tax, while the middles classes, those close to the average 114,420 dirhams would pay no more than 6.9%. Under this scheme, and following this income distribution, tax receipts would increase from existing 28.96 Bn dirhams to 46.82 Bn dirhams, with an overall income fiscal pressure of 6.3% of total Gross National Income. and we still get to exempt the poorest 651.600 households from income taxes. The windfall profit from the scheme is essentially motivated by the fact that income and tax distributions have been matched with the same random parameters, hence insuring perfect fairness in taxation, cutting red tape and making sure every individual has a clear understanding of the tax system.

Application: under this scheme, a household earning 111,000 dirhams would have to pay 4.68%  income tax, such:

and thus using the level of confidence to compute the custom income rate:

another household earning 117,000 would thus pay a 8.75% income tax rate. Simple, quick and easy to implement. In each case, households with comparative incomes would pay respectively 5,194 and 10,237 dirhams, which is still far below the respective taxes of 20,540 and 22,580 dirhams they would have to pay under the present tax code.

#Income Distribution 
#Phase 1: assume Income follows Normal Distribution
#Sample 1/1000 of total number of Households - HCP Census
n<-6516
I_M<-rnorm(n, mean=114420, sd= 1474)
hist(I_M, prob=TRUE)
quantile(I_M, probs = c(0.01,0.99,0.95, 0.25,0.5, 0.1, 0.05))
Tax_Norm<-rnorm(n, mean=0.07, sd=0.01)
quantile(Tax_Norm, probs = c(0.01,0.99,0.95, 0.25,0.5, 0.1, 0.05))

But we do not live in a Gauss-Laplace world; there are such high income inequalities that mean and median household income in Morocco are at a 2:1 ratio, yet another indicator of the disparities. As a matter of fact, I did point out -in a rather hurried manner- that the best estimate for income distribution across Moroccan households is the well-known Pareto distribution. I will try to provide a correct estimator this time, and from then on apply the proposed tax policy instrument;

Cumulative share of decile households (HCP)

How do we know income distribution in Morocco is indeed a Pareto distribution? Well, the first item to look at is the cumulative distribution function built from the published data; the graph gives compelling evidence that indeed income distribution is Pareto – which is not great news since it means high discrepancies in income across households, and subsequently unfair tax brackets embedded in the tax code.

The object of interest here is indeed income share per decile, and the basic idea is to match it up continuously with custom tax rates, hence eliminating tax brackets and all loopholes to the benefits of all: government receipts increase, and a pure tax rate ‘discrimination’ (discrimination in the sense that every individual has only to pay its own, intrinsic tax rate) allows for a lower tax burden compared to the present tax system. Everybody gains from it. Luckily enough, there is little to estimate; what is more, the properties of the Exponential distribution allow for some computations to run smoothly;

since we are considering a 1/1000 sample, the maximum income in this case is 1.18 Million dirhams – the richest household in this sample, so to speak. We check easily that the minimum income earned at the 1% level is 520,600 dirhams, while the median sample is 79,500 dirhams – which in line with the real-life data (75,500 dirhams)

The next batch of computations is pretty straightforward, we need income tax rates to match income distribution with its own Exponential distribution, and so:

#Phase 2: generation Exponential Income distribution
n<-6516
#Sample as previous: 1/1000 of total number of Households
I_Exp<-rexp(n, rate = 1/114420)
summary(I_Exp)
quantile(I_Exp, probs = c(0.01,0.99,0.90, 0.25,0.5, 0.1, 0.05))
Tax_Exp<-rexp(n,rate=1/7)
summary(Tax_Exp)
quantile(Tax_Exp, probs = c(0.01,0.99,0.90, 0.25,0.5, 0.1, 0.05))

And so we end up with interesting results: the richest 1% have to pay some 31.47% income tax – which is still below the nominal existing rate, and the median rate 4.73% for those earning around 79,500 per annum. The same computations apply equally to different incomes: for a household earning 86,000 dirhams, the custom rate would be 5.72%. All you have to do is look at the probability value at which household income wt lies, then match it up with the corresponding rate – with perhaps an exemption for the bottom 10%. Households below 420,000 dhs income would benefit from this scheme: median income households of 75,500 dirhams would pay about 4,873 dirhams compared to the 10,325 dirhams they would pay under the present tax system. As a matter of fact, even households earning 173,918 dirhams would pay 10.91%, i.e. 18,978 dhs which is still below 41,900dhs they would pay under the existing tax code.

Again, receipts from the new tax system under this scheme would top the existing receipts to 46.4Bn dirhams, way more than the, again, existing 28.96Bn, with no prejudice to the overall fiscal pressure relative to GDP or GNI.

the boost in fiscal receipts is mainly due to the tax discrimination effect described above – and the elimination of a host of loopholes and tax breaks do contribute as well.

The Case for Real Partisan Democracy

… and ultimately result in a reduction of the number of parties around.

November 25th General Elections reversed a trend observed since 1997: smaller parties endorse strong candidates for a winning ballot, depriving larger, mainstream parties from bigger caucuses in parliament, and in the process preventing strong coalitions to emerge. The proportional ballot tends to harm larger parties in specific constituencies when a smaller party (usually a breakaway group) manages to capture some votes and thus deprive the bigger party from gaining more seats on district slots.

But during this election, from all 33 competing parties, 18 managed to gain at least one seat, and seven top caucuses concentrate 90.5% of all 305 seats available on local ballot. One of the top seven parties -USFP- concentrates about the same number of seats the remaining 11. Needless to say that this is an improvement from 2007, where the top 7 parties had concentrated only 78% of local ballot seats, while 17 parties (and not 11) shared the remaining 65 seats. By HHI measures, concentration increased from 0.09 to 0.15. In politics, a concentrated parliament delivers stronger -and more accountable- government majority.

One of the reasons why so many parties are around is perhaps the lack of internal democracy within political parties, including those belonging to the historical Koutla; The process described by Abdellah Hamoudi is indeed very current: the leadership, more of an aggregate of father-figures, if not outright proponents of gerontocracy, kick out (or are kicked out of) the younger dissent that challenge their leadership, and these in turns create another party that seeks to capture the disgruntled activists. Post-1956 political history is littered with instances: In 1959, Mehdi Benberka, Abderrahim Bouabid and Abdellah Ibrahim decided to breakaway from the more traditional leadership in the person of Allal El Fassi and Mohamed Boucetta, and go on to found UNFP; Mohand Laenser in 1986 kicks out MP’s elder leader Mahjoub Aherdane -who in turn creates his own MNP party.There are very few instances of political parties with proven record in partisan, internal democracy, and this opacity in selecting political elites has worked as a deterrent to prevent a lot of Moroccan citizens to be involved with politics.Many political scientists however see in Feb20 demonstrations a revival of youth politics, and would be inclined to foresee -and I tend to agree with this view- an imminent renewal in our political personnel.

There is also another institutional roadblock to the revival of “big party politics”: I argue that Koutla parties, weakened by an Alternance Consensuelle they failed to turn to their advantage, fell back on more traditional, Moul Chkara -local notabilities- ton insure their caucus does not wane. USFP and Istiqlal, both electoral juggernauts tend to draw their typical Political Bosses from rural, traditional constituencies, a trend more acutely observable since 1997, where their elected delegations from Casablanca, Rabat or Agadir steadily decreased to marginal results form November 2011. Weakness in internal democracy, once justified by the struggle Koutla parties had to leader against Makhzen-led rival parties (MP in 1957 as a strong rival to Istiqlal, RNI and UC to Istiqlal and USFP, and more currently PAM as an anti-PJD bulwark)

One would think that parties lacking both internal democracy and a reliable stock of local notabilities would eventually die away; UC, while being out of office at least since 1992, still hangs on and manages to produce a decent caucus with the 2011 elections. And yet, they look like a smaller version of RNI: both share a common history of ‘Born To Rule’ kind of party, and their faith in all-out free-market ideology is undoubted.

What I would like to discuss is a two-steps legislation I believe would change the political landscape in a very short period of time: political finances and multi-party membership. I’d better start with the former.

Multi-party membership

as it is now, the law forbids a citizen to accrue membership:

Article 26

Nul ne peut adhérer à plus d’un parti politique

It is very counter-intuitive. How come one individual could be involved with more than one party? And there goes the ‘Moroccan Exception’: Morocco has a multi-party system not out of an inherent and vibrant pro-democracy stance, but because a large number of political organizations weakens that very democracy – and at times, it was even a way for the Makhzen to extend its hold over political legitimacy.

But what if we consider some kind of formalized relationship between smaller and larger parties of similar political persuasions; a small party has little chances to go beyond a nationwide 6% of popular vote on general elections; they get a seat, or two, possible 5 at best, but not enough to gain some representation on the national ballot, and that hurts larger parties with whom they share similar constituencies. So a deal can be made to help both parties, especially if they share a common history and ideology: the smaller party can ask to join a large party of their choice during ordinary convention. And given the larger party’s acceptance, an ad hoc common convention at the end of which a common document is produced detailing the quotas devoted to the junior partner(s) in terms of platform contribution, leadership slots and even electoral agreements, e.g. what seats should be the partner’s and at what level.

What are the pay-offs for each party then? That’s a contract for sure, and it is best when self-enforced, meaning, that both co-contractors find their benefit in the deal. For junior parties, the benefits are immediate and obvious: niche constituencies at local level with little competition from stronger parties: local community board, perhaps even slots at the regional assemblies (we just have to wait for the Organic Bills that regulate Regional elections) the opportunity to weigh-in nation-wide on policy-making, and finally, better organization and finances.

"A personality problem" (Image: Aujourd'hui Le Maroc)

And if the junior party is happy with the alliance, they might want to merge altogether, no problem. Meanwhile, it is their own valuation for a seat in parliament that will condition the essential motive for the whole thing: do they really want to compete so badly, or are they ready to trade an improbable race for parliament for a surer victory at local level?

The senior party benefits from the ‘alliance’ during general elections: we consider some seats contested during the November 2011 ballot; In Rabat’s both districts, there were 137 competitors for 7 slots. In Casablanca, the same goes: 34 seats attracted 640 candidates. Tangiers, finally, attracted 110 candidates for 5 slots. Mohand Laenser, the Representative for Boulemane, could have carried his n°2 as well, if the MDS didn’t put a good fight in his constituency: the Haraki vote was therefore split, and Laenser’s majority weakened substantially. Larger constituencies typically tend to attract more candidates from all parties, but ironically enough, tend to harm more larger parties – in a sense, PJD’s victory was more out of their competitors’ weaknesses than some sort of popular mandate.

This convoluted argument for a multi party-membership is due to the equally convoluted state of politics, and that goes especially for the Left. The number of political parties with an explicit reference to the Left, Socialism or Progress is now 11 – joined lately, it seems, with the PAM. The same goes for ‘Conservative’ or ‘Rural’ parties. I mean, the sole existence of a dozen of parties -no doubt with such nuanced differences in ideology- only confirms the lack of internal democracy, or a mere issue of egos. The idea is to create some material incentives for smaller parties to come together with larger parties and at the same time spare their leadership some self-pride in the process.

Party Finances

Article 28

Les ressources financières du pari proviennent:

- des cotisations de ses membres;

- des dons, legs et libéralités, en numéraires ou en nature, sans que leur montant ou valeur global (sic) ne puisse dépasser 100,000 dirhams par an et par donateur;

- des revenus liés à ses activités sociales et culturelles;

- du soutien de l’Etat

The need to make sure politics stays clean of any dirty money is to get public finances to step in. Sadly enough, Morocco has an abysmal record on how the State managed money in the political process. Perhaps a shrewder move is to abolish public-funded schemes altogether. Large parties already enjoy big donations besides regular public money, and smaller organizations will eventually force themselves to put their act together once that lifeline is cut – some will have to merge with other parties, others will just disappear – there is no longer money for the smaller leadership to retain followers.

On the other hand, the 100,000 limit is absurd. It really is. La Vie Eco reportedly priced an electoral campaign to 1 Million dirhams. The spending limits on electoral campaign too are ludicrous – especially so when one considers that these limits are not indexed to inflation, these have been imposed by bureaucratic fiat.

Perhaps lawmakers were being protective of the right to constitute a political party by giving a ‘fair and equal chance’ and strict regulation. But the fact is, larger parties already enjoy a substantial advantage. Scrapping such legislation will harm no one, it will only recognize the fact that 100,000 dirhams are not enough to run a party. The same goes for limits on polling too, and both activities go hand in hand: it will take a lot of money to order polling, a business now intimately associated with modern politics.

Moroccan Elections for the Clueless Vol.15

The easiest way to remember what a party stands for is, perhaps, to adopt some sort of recognition manual compiling political logos and such.This is especially so, in a country where 44% of adult population cannot read and write; a picture speaks a thousand words, although there are some hidden ideas and symbolism better to be put out there for everyone to see.

As early as 1997, political parties were encouraged to adopt logos instead of pictures -that was eventually put into official use with the 2002 elections. But nonetheless, their choice does try to relate to their identity, ideology or core issues; Here are some parties with their pre-2002 logos.

Koutla Parties

Pre-2002 USFP Logo

USFP- Union Socialiste des Forces Populaires: Ever since its founding convention in 1975, the Socialist party has adopted the European-style “Fist & Rose” that befits its Left-of-Centre credentials and Socialist International member status. Whatever its pre-1997/1998 rethoric about deep structural changes, the party has committed very early on to moderate, even social-democrat policies that sometimes are belied by frequent populist or plain socialist statements by some prominent members ever since USFP turned mainstream.

The Socialist International (Wikipedia)

But in 2002, the party decides to get rid of the fist and keep the rose; it seems the idea was to ditch the French benchmark -it is worth mentioning that Moroccan socialists kept some close ties with their French comrades, Michel Rocard and Abderrahim Bouabid for instance, were close friends indeed. But that 2002 lifting was perhaps a signal that USFP leadership was more fascinated with the UK Labour Party (whose leader back then managed a second landslide during the 2001 Elections) and thus produced a new logo with the rose alone, purple or pink depending on the circumstances.

If anything, by changing their logo, USFP are perhaps pushing around the idea that not only they have turned mainstream and become good “government coalition” material, they will not challenge the establishment any more; testimony to USFP grandee Mohamed El Yazghi who famously said: “The Makhzen No Longer Exists”

1997 Istiqlal Logo

Istiqlal: It may strike the observe as odd for Istiqlal to adopt the balance as its political logo. The party is notorious for its elitist recruitment, and is frequently associated to Fez and its centuries-long intellectual, financial and political elite, a close environment that has attracted criticism and accusations of nepotism and “family politics”. But the thing is, during the 1970s, Istiqlal ideologues came up with a brilliant concept to attract popularity and votes: egalitarianism.

Istiqlal Founder and figurehead Allal El-Fassi, a Salafi Islamic Scholar and National Movement figure, was at pains to find some suitable strategy efficient enough to block the alluring effects of socialism and Third-World liberation on Moroccan Youth in the immediate years following independence. And then came the idea that every Moroccan is born equal. The concept is too abstract, for it does not come at odds with constitutional principles, or with positions held by other political parties. But it seems there is a sense among Istiqlal High Command that egalitarianism might strike a chord with the electorate. Also, figures like Mhamed Boucetta and Boubker Kadiri for instance, old-guard Istiqlalis and treasurers of “Si Allal” ‘s legacy have maintained that idea all the way, hence the balance symbol. It is as though Istiqlal party has to remind constantly the electorate that they are not the party of the privileged few, a bit like the UK Conservative Party and their “One Nation Conservatism“.

pre-2002 PPS logo

PPS – Parti du Progrès et du Socialisme: the former Communist Party had to chose a neutral symbol for many reasons; contrary to Istiqlal and USFP, PPS had to go through two legal censures (PCM 1960 and PLS in 1968) before it reaches its current form in 1974. From then on, the party has almost reneged on its communist heritage and does sometimes sound a bit like a conservative party on too many issues.

It is a bit strange for them to change the logo so radically from sunshine (or sunset, depending on how one sees it) to an open book. Perhaps the party wanted to emphasis its intellectual roots and revert to more conventional colours (white & blue) Perhaps the ambition for a shining Morocco was cast aside in favour to more down-to-earth issues, to go by the book, so to speak. But overall, the change in logo and political talking points on PPS’ behalf does show a deep re-branding.

OADP - 1997

OADP-GSU-PSU (Organisation d’Action Démocratique Populaire/ Parti-Gauche Socialiste Unifié[e]): First off, PSU is boycotting the election. But one of its ancestors, OADP, has been a Koutla member in 1992, and the candle was kept on as a symbol, but eventually changed progressively in shapes and…numbers.

2002 Logo.

It seems the choice of a candle refers to wisdom, a quest for truth, and underlines one of the core issues heralded by OADP ever since its foundation in 1981: Human Rights. Though it did not participate in the 1997 Alternance Consensuellegovernment, OADP caucus supported on many issues, but eventually joined back opposition after a wide rift on the pace of reforms with

In 2002, OADP merged with three small Radical Left organizations, and then merged with a USFP breakaway in 2005 to create PSU, this time with one candle-again.

“Administrative Parties”

"Haraka Family" pre-2007

MP – Mouvement Populaire & MNP – Mouvement National Populaire: that party has some troublesome history. Originally MP was founded in 1957 as a reaction to perceived Istiqlal hegemony over political legitimacy and administrative control. The “Torch Of Freedom” logo is a reminder of from where MP grandee and founder Mahjoubi Aherdane comes from, as one of the MLA-North leader in 1955. The Moroccan Liberation Army has had a motley of logos and recognition flashes, but one that seemed to create consensus was the Torch of Freedom; in many official visits paid by King Mohamed V to MLA units, their Flag Of Honour (green with golden linings) featured it, many official documents where stamped with it, and so on and so forth.

MNP logo becomes the new MP's in 2005

This MLA legacy is also a response to the Koutla’s favourite criticism of MP and other parties as “Administrative creatures” made up by the Interior Ministry to bar Istiqlal & USFP/UNFP from power. In 1986, Aherdane was kicked out of his party in favour of now MP leader Mohand Laenser; he then proceeded to create his own party (MNP) and chose the Wheat as a symbol to remind voters yet again of MP/MNP’s core constituency, the rural electorate.

In 2002 however, MNP chose to ditch the Torch in favour of the traditional Moroccan dagger -perhaps a younger electorate would not necessarily associate the symbol with MLA since very few heard of it; After the 2005 reunion, the Torch was definitely cast aside, and the rural-oriented Wheat logo was retained.

Pre-2002 RNI logo

RNI – Rassemblement National des Indépendants: these have changed the symbol, but kept the blue colour (somehow associated to conservatism in Europe)

The symbol itself is a bit of a mystery : there’s a flower, and some sort of crescent below; I take it their pre-2002 is some sort of flower of elaborate design they ditched in favour of the more recognizable blue dove. The choice of that particular bird is somehow difficult to read, either as a testimony to the party’s commitment to centrist politics, or as projected image of non-partisan party, a party that puts the good of a nation above that of special interests. On the other hand, the blue colour does denote their commitment to conservative policies, ones they have supported ever since the party was founded in 1978 and in office ever since.

Other party logos will be blog-posted next time.

The Future of Radicalism in Morocco: Tribunite or Policy-driven Alternative?

This is a bit excruciating for me. As the idea started forming in my mind, I thought it would sound and look like I have abdicated what I hold to be my core, inner beliefs. To be more precise, this is not about abdicating principles, but rather how the Radicalism trademark in Morocco might have been pushed further to the left, too much to my liking, because of the hardened position taken by Feb20. I do not disparage the risks and the police harassment they endure, but this is not the only way to get the word out an active opposition is alive and kicking.

The referendum was the starting point: I belong to this crazy group of people who thought (or still thinks) that a deep constitutional reform is the way to bringing genuine democracy into Moroccan institutions and society. The assumption upon which the whole gamble plays on is that absolute political power will create some seismic moves in every political party, topple down the old-guard in favour of some fresh new faces, and eventually piece together the political spectrum into a couple of large parties instead of the existing myriad. This is so because in that context, politicians would be genuinely held accountable by the public; On the other end of those reforms, the Monarchy, while losing all executive and judiciary power, would retain the honorary function as the unifying symbol of this nation. Or so the story went.

The sinking ship: The candle is blown, the torch too. The seal is broken as well.

After the referendum however, this fig-leaf was blown away because any political organization pushing for a constitutional reform right away after a referendum very few mainstream organization gainsaid. A more methodological state of mind would command to re-direct energies into more “popular” issues: purchasing power, income inequalities, Amazigh issues, Gender equality, Education, Security, Crime, whatever topic considered to be a bread-and-butter issue with the electorate. So far the prevailing sense among the Radical Left and those of similar loyalties gravitating around the Feb20 Movement is to keep the focus on figurehead issues, emotionally appealing but ultimately isolating the movement and confining it into an active but small nucleus of activists, like AMDH’s for instance.

And that’s where the excruciating part comes in: Am I still to be counted among the Left-wing Moroccan Radicals? I guess the “Confused” part was doing just fine, but I now feel more estranged than ever toward my party, let alone the whole political field. I disagreed on the Referendum and Elections boycott, I have been reviewing some of the proposals displayed in the 2007 Manifesto, and there goes the “fig-leaf” analogy: as long as the Radical Left (including, with a broad definition of reformism, Annahj) keeps aiming at global changes instead of looking for real issues, their credibility, as a matter of fact their whole brand of fresh politics is watered-down with perceived idealism, or worse still, elitism.It is a bit strange to conciliate seemingly contradictory notions of the Left being Tribunite and Elitist at the same time; but the fact of the matter is, this is the danger: a couple of days ago, PADS party has issued a statement stating its court action to declare November 25th General Elections to be unconstitutional. This is the perfect example of populist/elitist argument that does not appeal to real issues, and at the same time gives comfort to the very people the statement is supposed to frighten; the shot was to high, too much aimed at the moon that it actually backfires in terms of image and credibility: “PADS? why these Leftists are interested only in remote matters nobody cares!” or so goes the line.

To put it simply, many at the Radical Left leadership are rekindling with their youth, and instead of building alternatives for the ongoing politics, they have just got to relive the dream that fell short in the 1970s and 1980s. What makes it worse is the new generation of activists, all with noble intentions and high principles, but not necessarily ready -or geared for it- to play Point Counter-Point on specific issues, is pushing the old guard to engage in a more confrontational strategy. It might indeed fire up the strong supporters, but it leaves out the Silent Majority and all of the semi-sympathetic groups that do not see benefits in taking to the streets every Week-ends.

What is to be done then? Well, we need a narrative to attract the broadest possible spectrum around a precise consensus. The trouble is, the least common denominator needs to be defined within the established system; There’s Radicalism and Radicalism, and my brand is the latter: keep the Monarchy as the form of political regime, and shuffle up the rest; in the eyes of many who might disagree, the brand of radicalism is insured, and it does not attract much hostility from less ideologically motivated opponents. The narrative needs to stress issues designed to mollify social conservatism predominant across Moroccan households; The idea that improving standards of living can lead to a more progressive social mindset should be the centrepiece of the Radical discourse. Civil Rights can only be enjoyed with a good meal, a decent home and an interesting job. But this is not enough, it remains too abstract for everyone to adhere.

There is a population in this country working just as hard as everybody else, yet it pays commensurately more taxes, loses on its purchasing power over the last decade. The middle/median class is the perfect group of people the Radical Left should be embracing by providing policies designed to strengthen its income, future, security and standing in society. I suppose all of the Radical Left-wingers are Marxists, so perhaps it is a good time to leave out the philosophical trolling, and go for policy proposals that go to what shapes up social interactions and structures, the economy itself. In simple words: “It’s the Economy, Comrade.“

Moroccan Elections for the Clueless Vol.13

What would it take for a party (or more likely, for a coalition of parties) to win elections and form a government next November 25th?

This is the immediate post-elections worry: right after the polling stations are closed, when the electoral map shapes up, no matter what the turnout is, the process of forming the next government is boiling down to simple arithmetics on the number of seats. Because the Head of Government needs a vote of confidence, he’d better be sure he’d already secured the votes and the seats. It is as simple as it gets: there are 395 seats, and the next government needs to secure a 198 seats-strong super-caucus (a 197 seats in fact, considering the number of small parties in parliament). As for the ways and means to secure such a majority, the discrepancies in computing majorities on local and national ballots (NB) make it trickier.

The super-caucus has two (actually three, but the same computation applies to the Women’s and Youth’s ballot) classes of seats: locally-elected representatives, some 295 of them, and candidates on national ballots, 60 women and 30 young men. The national ballot results are to be computed following Art.85 of OB 27-11 organizing the House of Representatives: first, political parties failing to reach the 3% threshold of popular votes are eliminated (just like those local candidates with less than 6% votes, as per Art.84′s provisions) and the number of seats allocated per remaining party in the same way candidates are elected on local ballots commensurately to a certain factor computed on the number of votes per seat. And so, parties with large caucuses (that is, a caucus of 30 representatives and more) are more likely to trust the national ballot seats. But the next leading party needs to have some strong allies too. Why so? First because no political party in Morocco can seriously claim to carry an absolute majority of seats. And second, a coalition of strong parties has a better chance at capturing a large caucus on the national ballot. By contrast, a coalition with one strong senior partner and smaller parties, while it can claim some percentage on the NB slots, will be handicapped on its overall majority.

Nonetheless, the A8 “Alliance of Democracy” might well prove to be a smart combination of small and large parties: the juniors partners have only slim possibilities to go beyond the 6% threshold nationwide, and thus would not, in theory, capture collectively more than a dozen seats and no slot on NB. Their mission, in short, is to make up for the shortfall if the larger partners fail to deliver, but only just. the big quarter, RNI-PAM-MP-UC has to claim a large but specific chunk of seats because of the double constraint on their coalition strategy: as de jure Leader of the Coalition, RNI needs a strong showing as first party in terms of votes, a tough challenge, considering PJD, Istiqlal and USFP will not go down without a fierce fight.

By playing their cards right, the A8 coalition might well win the election with less than 153 seats on local ballot but more than 45 seats on national ballot, so as to reach the magic number of 198 easily, and if the quarter falls short of overall majority by a seat or two, the small parties gravitating around can make it up.

And so the assumption goes as follows: PJD can carry as much as 60 seats on local ballots -which is not out of the realm of possibilities. RNI needs to beat that number, say by carrying 65 seats. Because the assumption goes with RNI and PJD as the two leading parties, they will each get around 18 seats on national ballot; by setting the strongest terms as such, they will also condition the number of national ballot seats for other parties. A further assumption sets PPS as the party with the smallest caucus on these slots -which was the case for 2002 and 2007- as well as allowing for some estimations on what is the number of seats PAM, MP and UC need to carry so as to maximize both their overall caucus and their standing on NB.

Projection for an equilibrium case - A8 coalition vs PJD, Koutla and other parties.

The set of assumption goes on, with UC as the ‘weakest link’ of the quarter, and finally MP and PAM measuring up to Istiqlal and USFP (that is, carrying roughly the same number of seats, with a slight advantage to the Administrative Parties in terms of local caucuses- the NB seats will not vary much in this case). And so the result goes as follows: for UC with locally-elected 20 representatives-strong caucus (plus 6 on national ballot) marks the lower boundary for A8 (and PPS with a couple of seats less, the boundary for the present Koutla)

The graph shows an absolute majority for A8 coalition, but that was only possible for each quarter member strong enough to place a percentage close to RNI and PJD results. And that is the key for a winning coalition; a mixture of strong parties to shore up seats from NB slots, and smaller parties to make up the shortfall because the slots do not account for coalitions but only individual parties.

 I am aware these assumptions are too restrictive (meaning they might not apply at all) and rely too much on an over-rationalization of Moroccan politics. But so far, and save perhaps for some rumours and noises on possible defections and turnabout, it seems there is a clear intent, from the A8 coalition’s side, in sticking it to PJD and promote RNI as ‘The First Party’. In what terms, and how would that apply is left to question.