Assahafa.com
Morocco’s Permanent Mission to the United Nations in New York organized an international research seminar on Tuesday on “Linguistic and Cultural Identity in Territorial Autonomous Regions”.
The seminar was led by prominent experts, researchers, and academics, notably from Switzerland, Spain, France, and Portugal. It was attended by some fifty diplomats, including several ambassadors in New York, senior UN officials, and media accredited to the United Nations.
This meeting compared the Autonomy initiative proposed by the Kingdom for the Sahara region with other autonomy initiatives around the world, particularly with regard to the preservation of the linguistic and cultural identity of autonomous regions within the framework of territorial or regional autonomy statutes on several continents.
International experts had the opportunity to share experiences from the Spanish Basque Country, the French island of Corsica, the Chinese Special Administrative Region of Macau, and the constituent country of Aruba within the Netherlands.
Marc Finaud, Senior Advisor at the Geneva Centre for Security Policy, who moderated the seminar, noted that Morocco has launched a series of international comparative academic seminars since 2009 on several aspects of territorial autonomy, including self-determination, human rights, regionalization, development models, the role of civil society, external relations, the resolution of political disputes, and attracting foreign investment.
Addressing the seminar’s theme, the speaker emphasized that Morocco’s Initiative for the Autonomy of the Sahara region includes several provisions relating to cultural and linguistic identity, notably Article 5, which stipulates that the populations of the Sahara will have the financial resources necessary for the development of the region in all areas and will actively participate in the economic, social, and cultural life of the nation.
He further cited Article 12, which stipulates that these populations will exercise powers, within the territorial boundaries of the region, also in the area of cultural affairs, including the promotion of the Hassani cultural heritage of the Moroccan Sahara.
For his part, Asier Aguirresarobe, a postdoctoral researcher in history at the University of the Basque Country (UPV-EHU) in Spain, noted that several points of the Autonomy Initiative presented by Morocco in 2007 reflect a commitment to the cultural and linguistic protection of the specificity of the Sahara region.
Regarding cultural attributions, the Moroccan Initiative recognizes that autonomous institutions in the Sahara will participate in the broader cultural life of the Moroccan nation, she noted, referring to Article 5 of the Autonomy Initiative, adding that Article 12 of the same Initiative also establishes the competence of regional authorities in matters of education and cultural affairs.
She pointed out that these provisions echo Article 5 of the Kingdom’s 2011 Constitution, which states that “the State shall work to preserve the Hassaniyya as an integral component of Moroccan cultural unity, as well as to protect its speakers and the concrete cultural expression of Morocco”.
For her part, Vanessa Amaro, Associate Professor at the Center for Portuguese Studies at the Polytechnic University of Macau, indicated that the autonomy in the Chinese Special Administrative Region of Macau and the one proposed by Morocco for the southern provinces envisage a form of decentralized governance that preserves national sovereignty while granting local authorities the ability to manage cultural, social, and educational affairs.
She also noted that the Moroccan initiative further proposes that the Sahrawi population exercise legislative, executive, and judicial powers in the region, particularly in matters of education, cultural promotion, and heritage preservation.
Agreeing with this, Dr. Júlio Reis Jatobá, a member of the Faculty of Arts at the Polytechnic University of Macau, emphasized that Articles 5 and 12 of the Moroccan Autonomy Initiative specifically refer to the protection of Saharan Hassani cultural heritage, including linguistic traditions such as Hassani Arabic, as well as the development of local institutions such as artisan training centers, museums, and cultural festivals.
Noting the similarities between the constituent country of Aruba within the Netherlands and the Moroccan Sahara region, Marc Finaud noted in another intervention that both regions “enjoy or will enjoy broad autonomy that includes cultural heritage, languages, and education, but excludes foreign policy and defense”.
Furthermore, both elect their parliament and, indirectly, their government, which promulgates laws and regulations, particularly on education and culture, he noted, adding that to implement its policies, particularly in the areas of education and culture, the autonomous region benefits from its own resources, particularly tax revenues and natural resource revenues, but can also receive assistance from the central government (from the European Union in the case of Aruba).
Professor Dominique Verdoni, of the University of Corsica Pasquale Paoli, compared the degree of autonomy in Corsica with the provisions offered by the Moroccan Autonomy Initiative, particularly with regard to the preservation of linguistic and cultural identity in the Sahara region. She indicated that the Moroccan Initiative allows the people of the Sahara to manage their affairs democratically through legislative, executive, and judicial bodies with exclusive powers.
They will have access to the financial resources necessary for the development of the region in all areas and will actively participate in the economic, social, and cultural life of the nation, she noted, adding that in the case of Corsica, it is more a matter of “adaptive power” where there is no legislative power in the true sense of the term.
“There is no possibility of voting on laws,” she said, explaining that it is the National Assembly that votes on laws, and the Corsican Assembly has the right to assess the adaptation of these texts to its reality or to request their revision and modification. For her, this process is long and complicated, and has so far not yielded results. In the case of the Moroccan Autonomy Initiative, which provides legislative powers to the populations of the Sahara, “it is much more operational,” she said.
Commenting on the provision of the Moroccan Autonomy Initiative, which allows the populations of the Sahara region to exercise powers, particularly in the areas of education and cultural affairs, including the promotion of the Hassani cultural heritage of the Sahara, Verdoni spoke of an awareness of the existence of cultural and linguistic differences and a recognition that these situations will allow for the enrichment of citizens’ skills and that this is in no way a process of substitution or monolingualism.
She also noted that, like the Moroccan Sahara, where the preservation of the region’s cultural heritage is materially and financially supported by the central government, Corsica also benefits from funding and is supported through human resource allocations, emphasizing, however, the need to set language planning objectives.
This international seminar highlighted the importance of the Moroccan Initiative for the negotiation of an autonomy status for the Sahara region, in terms of Morocco’s efforts to preserve regional cultural and linguistic identity at the national level and the regional government’s responsibilities in education, the preservation of regional language and culture, and its relationship with the central government in these areas.
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