Rabat – Rachid Bougha
The Moroccan government has been formed, headed by Abdelilah Benkirane, Secretary General of PJD. Ministers are ready to head to Ifrane to be officially appointed as ministers for the new government and to swear-in before the Moroccan King. It was confirmed to ‘Arabstoday’ that the Moroccan PM amended his governmental list and submitted it to King Mohammed VI last Saturday. The amendment included that Ramid gets to keep the Justice Ministry – an issue of controversy last week – while some other changes occurred. Moroccan website Goud published a government ministers’ list, reported to be the “final list including the ministers invited to Ifrane”. The list went as follows: Justice and Development Part (PJD) Prime Minister: Abdelilah Benkirane Minister of State without portfolio: Abdallah Baha Minister of Foreign Affairs: Saadeddine Othmani Minister of Government Public Affairs: Naguib Bolife Minister of Transportation and Equipment: Abdelaziz Rabbah Minister of Justice: Mostafa Ramid Minister of Parliament Relations: Lahib Shoubani Minister of High Education: Lahoucin Daoudi Minister of Family and Solidarity: Basima Haqqawi Minister of Commerce and Industry: Abdel Qader Emara Party of Progress and Socialism Minister of Housing and Construction: Mohamed Nabil Benabdallah Minister of Health: Doctor Lahoucin al-Wardi Minister of Employment: Abdel Wahid Soheil The Popular Movement: Minister of Interior: Mohand Laenser Minister of Modernization of Public Sector: Mohammed Ouzzine Minister of Tourism: Lacoucin Haddad Minister of Youth and Sport: (could be assigned to a woman as the party nominated 4 women for the post) Istiqlal Party Minister of Economy and Finance: Nizar Baraka Minister of Energy and Minerals: Fouad Doueri Minister of Culture and Meda: either al-Hassan Abdel Khaliq or Abdallah Baqali Minister of National Education: (Royal palace disapproved of Kinza al-Ghali) Sovereign Ministries, selected by the royal palace (most are still confidential) Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries: Aziz Akhannouch It is worth mentioning that this finalised list came after tense negotiations amongst the coalition members. Slight changes were made by the king such as the ministry of Finance which was divided into portfolios, where the Ministry of Budget and Public Accounts was given to Idris Azmi, from PJD, and the Ministry of Economy and Finance was assigned to Nizar Baraka from Istiqlal.