Reaching a new milestone

After Agadir, which defined the framework for the implementation by each region of its own and shared skills, Tangiers hosted the 2nd National Conference on Advanced Regionalization on Friday 20 and Saturday 21 December 2024 on «Advanced Regionalization, between the Challenges of Today and Tomorrow».

Today, this institutional architecture is called upon to take a new step. It is in this sense that HM the King, who addressed a royal message to the participants in these meetings, emphasized a series of challenges still to be met.

At the forefront of those challenges is the acceleration of the operationalization of the Charter of administrative decentralization through «the mobilization of all potential resources and the involvement of all ministerial departments, in the service of the effective implementation of the Charter, for greater speed in the preparation of the master plans of administrative decentralization which is based on an effective transfer of attributions and decision-making powers, at the regional level.»

This also concerns aspects related to the audit and operationalization of the attributions of local authorities. The strengthening of participatory democracy at regional and local levels is also an issue.

Citizens and associations must be involved in the process of developing, preparing, implementing, monitoring and evaluating public policies taken with elected councils, to achieve the objectives set, reads the royal message. The fourth challenge is the one related to the principle of correlation of responsibility to accountability in the field of territorial affairs management. Its objective is to fight corruption, by developing the philosophy of control and accountability, in accordance with the constitutional principle that articulates the exercise of responsibility to accountability, it is mentioned in the royal message .

The fifth challenge is improving the attractiveness of territorial areas to attract productive investments, as an essential lever for strengthening sustainable development. Added to this is the challenge related to the Regions’ ability to design new financing mechanisms; and that of dealing with certain crises and adapting to today’s transformations and tomorrow’s impacts. In addition to these seven challenges, the Regions are also called upon to quickly take measures to address water stress and develop mobility and digitalization.

Aziz DIOUF