Citizen participation at the heart of regional governance

Adil Barakat

President of the Regional Council of Béni Mellal-Khénifra, Morocco.

After 2021, the Béni Mellal-Khénifra region has made a firm commitment to the path of an open, inclusive and transparent government. Our ambition is to bring public decision-making closer to citizenship by strengthening transparency and building a development model based on territorial justice, participation, and innovation. 

The participatory elaboration of our Regional Development Plan has mobilised over 400 non-governmental organizations through public consultations and workshops in the five provinces. We have made sure to achieve that this process is accessible to all by simplifying documents in dialectical Arabic, producing videos in sign language, and printing Braille versions. 

We have also made the regional budget more readable and accessible by elaborating a citizen’s budget, training regional agents and raising the awareness of over 110 participants from different provinces.

Our public innovation laboratories have enabled us to experiment with new collaborative approaches around strategic projects, such as the ecotourism development in Azilal, and the promotion of agro-alimentary industries. These initiatives involved 118 participants, representing diverse institutions, associations, cooperatives, companies, and public actors. 

The use of digital technology was also reinforced with the launch of the platform “Infitah.cink.ma”, a true transparence tool  for employement projects and regional investment. This platform nowdays is a bridge between the regional administration and citizenship. 

The regional commitment has looked to be inclusive: women, youth, people with disabilities, marginalized populations... all became partners through forums, workshops, thematic discussion groups and co-implementation committees.

Our partnership with the National Democratic Institute (NDI) and the ILTIZAM program, supported by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) have consolidated this approach. Thanks to this, we have launched calls for innovation, strengthened the capacities of local civil society, and organized a regional Forum on participatory democracy, gathering over 160 associative and institutional actors.

Aware that participation cannot be limited to a regional scale, we supported local communities, especially Khénifra , to diffuse this culture of dialogue and citizen commitment. A pilot project carried out with the AMOUJ association has made it possible to concretize this proximity work through the elaboration of petitions, consultative reports and request for access to information. 

Although challenges remain- such as the lack of technical capacities of civil society organizations, the need to continually mobilize vulnerable groups and the limited involvement of certain local communities- our course is set. We will work to perpetuate the achievements of the ILTIZAM program beyond its financial support, institutionalize citizens’ forums at regular intervals, extend participatory mechanisms to the municipal and provincial levels, and strengthen interregional cooperation in Morocco and Africa.

Our region has a bet for governance based on trust, transparency, and co-responsibility. The results obtained today are not an end in themselves, but the basis for a more participatory, fair and sustainable future.

I would like to thank all the actors who collaborate with us: citizens, associations, national and international partners. Together we are building a region where everyone has a place, a voice and a role to play.