♪ host: this is al jazeera. these telecom billionaire has be prime minister. his cabinet faces an economic fuel shortages, and power cuts. israel he police say they have caught two of six palestinian prisoners who escaped on monday. their escape prompted a manhunt by israeli law enforcement and

the army. in gaza and the occupying west bank, protests to show solidarity with palestinian prisoners. but the israeli authorities not allowing families to visit inmates. the west african alliance held talks with guinea's new military rulers. they also met with the ousted president and demanded his release. the world food program is warning that nearly all afghans are going hungry, with many going to extreme measures to survive. >> what we have found is that the number of families are resorting to extreme coping mechanisms, skipping meals or preferring to give food to children instead of adults, or

reducing portion sizes to make food last longer. now, three out of four afghan families at least if not more are going without food. host: an appeals court in florida says schools cannot force students and staff to wear masks. it is a victory for the states republican governor who created in order against mask mandates in july. those are the headlines. you are up to date. here is inside story. ♪

bernard: a conservative development party is kicked out of office. the party that won the most seats will declare a new government. has morocco closed a chapter 10 years after nationwide protests calling for change? this is "inside story. bernard: hello, and welcome to a second inside story about morocco. the justice and development party has headed the government here for a decade. but in wednesday's elections, they lost 113 of their 125 seats

, a result seen as the rejection of a policy that adopted unpopular policies that alienated many voters. now, morocco will be run by a new party. will that lead to change? >> the business tycoon expected to be the new prime minister addressed party supporters on thursday. >> we want to build a strong coalition capable of securing the grand island and large-scale product -- projects and government that is able to continue the path of development that his majesty has laid out. >> the parliament will not be able to govern alone. they only got 97 of 375 seats,

which means they will have to form a coalition government with other parties. both of these political forces are said to be close to the palace in morocco, where the king still retains the vast majority of power. but the biggest headline is the resounding defeat of the party that had won the last two elections in 2011 and 2015. the pjd saw its party's share of seats diminished to just 12. within hours of the results, the entire leadership of the party announced their resignations. >> the responsibility for the party's failure. based on this, the entire secretariat announced their resignation, effective immediately. >> wednesday's vote was the

first time the new law was implemented. from the outset, parties claimed it was unfair and only being used to reduce candidates chances of winning. many analysts called the protest vote the main reason for the party lack of success. >> they were defeated because first of all, they did not deliver their promises, and people are fed up with their code of conduct and their moral duties, etc.. so that's number one. people don't have jobs, especially after the pandemic, and they are not able to create jobs or wealth. >> liberal parties now occupy the majority of seats in rocco's parliament. voters seem to have punished the

former prime minister for his party's failure in improving conditions. will a new government be able to bring forth the economic reform and change people have been asking for, and is that even possible in a system where all power ultimately lies with the king? ♪ bernard: let's bring in our guests. lahcen haddad is a former minister of tourism and political analyst. jasper hamann is a columnist for morocco world news. and mohamed el hachimi is a senior research fellow in social science. mohamed, if i could start with you, have we gone back to before the arab spring with moroccan politics? mohamed: i think the best way to describe what happened is, it's

a situation, of particular situation, that i would describe as an expected surprise. expected given the nature of the political system. the government cannot really have the opportunity to implement its programs. so, it is very difficult to attribute all of the good things that happened in the last 10 years to the government. so it's kind of a system in which the last say belongs to the king. the second reason is there were serious internal divisions that started in 2016 with the previous prime minister. so this has actually hit the

unity of the party and it has continued to have a very bad impact. i think the other reason why this is expected is that they are not in favor of allowing an islamist political party to win elections for a third time. and it was not a defeat, it was a free fall. it was very, very astonishing the number of seats they lost. from 125 213 is incredible. -- 120 5-13 is incredible. bernard: do you see morocco going back as it was before the arab spring? jasper: one of the main issues

for the election was a choice of alignment. at the same time, i think this has also introduced a new era in moroccan politics were social media, technology, and social media savvy young candidates, as is the global trend, is becoming much more important. bernard: the party that won has been closer to the palace, royalists, you could say. will they be tempted to roll back democratic reforms now that there is a more favorable party in power? >> i think that's a theory that's probably not relevant. they are close to the palace and to the monarchy. before 2011, somebody very close

to the palace lead. i think these parties have operated more or less independently. it's a reformist party. so, i don't think it depends on who is close to the palace and who is not, but at the same time , i think all of them will have a specific agenda of the state that it's better to move on and move beyond. delivering to the population, delivering on their promises, i think there is a sense of that.

it's internal divisions, but they've also run out of the legitimizing discourse. in 2011, there was the deep state, russia, all of that, 2017 , it was more preventative, but in 2021, there is no rallying cry. they did not deliver all of their promises. bernard: you have used the word islamist to describe the justice and development party. so many of these people are very far from having any sort of religious influence these days. can you help us understand what the pjd's philosophy was when it won the post arab spring

elections? mohamed: he started losing legitimacy since 2011 because he has been forced one way or another to endorse policies and political discourse, for example, fighting against corruption. he found himself reestablishing diplomatic ties because of the balance of power in the moroccan political system. there were big political and economic orientations defined by the palace. in practice, not according to

the constitution, the role of government is two things. the first is to help the team -- the king. the second is to take responsibility for failures in case of failure. we have been witnessing how a big part of the moroccan populace is criticizing the government, not as a structure, but it's a very cyclical. the loser is the head of the government. and when the party has been in power, this is really interesting. bernard: is that why he lost his

supporters? he didn't do what they wanted? he had to legalize cannabis cultivation for medical use, these sorts of policies. is that why they lost their support? lahcen: i think it's part of why. there were things were he did not deliver. he needed to deliver on some of those things. but the other thing is the national party that won the elections used a communication strategy whereby they took credit for all of this success, whereas all of the failures were the fault of someone else. at the same time, it had its own agenda. on the other hand, there were three things. one is that we are morally

honest. the second is we are going to fight corruption and we are going to move the economy forward. and third, we are going to have a better government in morocco. so a lot of people have kids but don't have jobs. there's a problem with that. and then, they didn't fight corruption. they did not deliver. and part of the capacity to deliver -- bernard: is this a blow for democracy if you are looking for democratic reform in morocco? jasper: in the current situation, the way the government is operating vis-a-vis the palace is the way

the constitution outlines it. this is the way democracy in its current state is supposed to work. we have a mock election for the leader, a real election for the parliament. in the party has been hamstrung by the palace. but at the same time, for democracy, you need young, engaged people, and that is what happened this time with the massive get out the vote turnout. so i think more alignment with the palace does not necessarily mean disavowing democracy. >> we often hear talk of the deep state in morocco, but is that a fair argument to make? lahcen: if i may go back to the question you asked to my colleague about democracy, i

think it depends on what you mean by democracy. in terms of advancing political reform, i think these results might reflect the process. but i think there is a very ambitious project which is -- and they think the main task of this government and the next government in five years is to implement it. so this will help with the quality of life of the people in morocco and improve some development. back to the question about the deep state. i think this is a very difficult

question to answer. as a political scientist, it's not a scientific concept. there are economic interests in morocco. i think it's very difficult to look at the moroccan case and the case of egypt and tunisia and compare them. morocco has always had its own way to do what moroccans do, but in a very different way. in morocco, the way we dealt with islamists was completely different. the moroccan strategy consists

of simply allowing them to integrate institutions as a way to take them, and then they will realize that it's not that easy to achieve in practice what they were promising to do. bernard: the leader is a billionaire businessman, former agriculture minister. he has talked about the need to move forward with the kings agenda, this economic development project with the parties in power. is there a good chance morocco can move forward and will the parties want to win that way? mohamed: i want to speak to the blow to democracy if i could because we have a hybrid regime. a hybrid representative type of government. i think that's what the

morocco's neat -- moroccans need. and in the arab world, we need those kinds of hybrid regimes because we need some stability. bernard: and i should say you are still involved in policy. mohamed: the geopolitical interests of the country exist. but i think it's also the fact that the elections have been free. there's a good chance. the moroccans have spoken, and they have three main parties in morocco now. they have three major parties.

they will go beyond the fact that there used to be some sort of unity in the government, the government that is going out now. i think they are more liberal leading -- leaning with some social agenda, and soon they will be able to govern all three. it's a very rare chance in morocco to have only three parties because before, you would have 6, 5, 4, and it's very difficult to create unity within that. so there is a good chance this will happen, and i think it's good for morocco and a big leap forward. bernard: there's enormous pressure and expectation. mohamed: especially in terms of social security and regional

dynamism, all of these things, there are very high expectations . but i think this government will demand a political mandate and with only three parties, i think they will be able to deliver. bernard: do you think they will be able to deliver and get a mandate from the king to deliver? jasper: i think they will need to do coalition building. at the same time, i do not envy our prime minister to be, to be honest, because the other parties are chameleons. they have their own party program. they are worried about job creation, the economy, but at the same time, they have national projects going on to vastly expand health care, vastly expand pensions, and this has all been done ahead of the election as a national project

that has deadlines within the five years they will be in power. and of course, the legalization of medical cannabis is going to create a giant agency through which billions might flow, and whether this can become an example of a morocco where corruption can be kept at bay, but there are plenty of pitfalls within that. especially as a billionaire prime minister, you could be fdr and deliver the new deal, or you could be seen as a self-serving person. bernard: will this new government, however it's made up , will it be able to deliver on huge challenges? youth unemployment, crony

capitalism charges, will they be able to meet these challenges? lahcen: no one can answer this question, but what i am sure about is that this government will not face the same challenges that they did because i am confident the political atmosphere will change completely in morocco. it will be 100% working with the king, for sure, and it will also take advantage of the fact that it's a politically homogenous government, a strong coalition, but the main channels, in addition to the high expectations for improving human development and the quality of the system in the nation is that

no one in this party has some kind of socially rooted consistent -- constituency. they are made up of notables who can win elections, but they cannot win over the population. i think this will be a coalition . they enjoy electoral legitimacy given the number of seats they won, but they have a big problem, in my opinion, because it's not enough to win elections to have popular legitimacy. bernard: unfortunately, time is out, but thank you to our guests.

and thank you for watching. you can see the program any time by visiting our website. for more, go to our facebook page. you can also join the conversation on twitter. for the whole team here in morocco, thanks for watching.

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