ISSUES. Launched by King Mohammed VI, the reform of the Family Code has entered its home stretch and is sparking debates on controversial subjects.
After six months of consultations, the proposed amendments, developed by the body responsible for revising the Family Code, were presented to the head of government, who would have already submitted them in turn to King Mohammed VI for royal arbitration. A step which will be followed by the development of the bill and its submission to Parliament for adoption. If the 2004 Family Code had the advantage of stimulating a dynamic of virtuous change, the Shereef sovereign considered, in a letter addressed to his head of government, on September 26, that it was necessary to “re-examine it in order to correct the dysfunctions and shortcomings that the experience of its implementation has revealed”. It is in these terms that Mohammed VI opened the way for the process of overhauling the Moudawana. The new version should make it possible to harmonize the provisions of the Family Code with “the progression of national legislation”, we read in a royal letter, in which the monarch instructed the head of the executive to pilot this operation, granting him a maximum period of six months. This process, based on a participatory approach, involved several institutions in the country, namely the Superior Council of Ulemas, the National Council for Human Rights, the government authority responsible for solidarity, social integration and the family, as well as civil society actors, researchers and specialists. More than 1,500 associations were heard by this commission, whose work has been completed.
