'Dégage Akhannouch': pro-PM official mocks Moroccans endorsing anti-PM campaign

"Those making the campaign (...) are poor sick people," said Morocco's head of its House of Representatives Monday in the first official comments regarding a growing digital campaign against Morocco's rich PM Aziz Akhannouch. 

"Should we support those making the campaign [a digital anti-PM campaign]? They are poor sick people. What we can do to them. May god cure them," said Rachid Talbi Alami on Monday during a conference of the PM's party the National Rally of Independents (RNI). 

Applause and laughter filled the room, as the RNI's members started booing the campaign. 

Alami, a member of the RNI, shut the bows down, saying, "No!  They are at the end, our Moroccan brothers. May god cure them."

L'insolent Rachid Talbi Alami souffle sur la braise… pic.twitter.com/H7nii9EA3q

— ET VOILA (@ETVOILA7) July 26, 2022

For the past three weeks, tens of thousands of social media users have tweeted the hashtag "Get out, Akhannouch" (Degage_Akhannouch), launching a massive digital campaign against Morocco's tycoon PM Aziz Akhannouch as fuel prices in the kingdom skyrocket.

As of Tuesday, #Degage_Akhannouch had been shared more than one million times on Facebook and Twitter.

Most users call for an immediate decrease in gas prices, accusing Akhannouch, who owns the largest gas distribution company in Morocco Afriquia Gaz, of benefiting from the crisis.

The statements of Alami have triggered more rage and anger among the already frustrated users.

"Talbi Alami called free Moroccans who dare to say, "NO" to the slippages of the current government "sick". Are we sick? they want us to be beaten without protesting," tweeted a user in French.

Talbi Alami a traité les marocains et marocaines lA7rar qui osent dire "NON" aux dérapages du gouvernement actuel de "malades".
Sommes nous des malades ? bghawna naklo l3sa o mangoloch "a77". #Degage_Akhennouch

— Amine Mss (@MssAmine1) July 27, 2022

In response, many Moroccan users decided to double down their digital activism, tweeting, "I am not sick and I participate in the campaign."

Al Alami's comments have also evoked a deja vu among Moroccan users who compared the ongoing campaign to the 2018 "Let It Spoil" campaign.

In 2018, facing a digital boycott campaign targeting the country's elite brands, including Akhannouch's Afriquia, the tycoon said, "Moroccans should be re-educated" as his party members applauded.

A palace's protégé and the 13th richest businessman in Africa, for many, Akhannouch is a symbol of everything Moroccans revolted against on 20 February 2011.

The tycoon has been at the centre of the crisis since winning the September 8 elections. 

 
The Justice and Development Party (PJD) and the Authenticity and Modernity Party (PAM) have accused Akahnnouch's party of "illegally using money" to win votes. PAM joined Akhannouch's coalition after it came second in the elections.

On 20 February this year, hundreds of Moroccans around the kingdom chanted for the first time, "Get out Akhannouch", as they voiced their fears of going a decade back in democracy under the Akhannouch era.

Facing the growing campaign, Akhannouch chooses once again to remain silent. 

Since winning the election last year, the PM gave one interview in January. Only two journalists from state TV were allowed to interview him.

For its part, pro-Akhannouch media have dismissed the campaign as "fake".

The state-owned news agency Maghreb Arab Press (MAP) said most of the accounts behind the campaign are fake, accusing the opposition of launching the hashtags to overturn the PM.

Abdelilah Benkirane, head of the opposition party PJD, has distanced himself from the ongoing campaign and said that Akhannouch should have more time to "show what he is capable of."

However, many of the members of the PJD have joined the campaign, urging an early election to end the political stalemate in the North African kingdom.