Morocco’s political season just found a new flashpoint: the government subsidy program meant to support livestock farmers. Driss Lachkar, First Secretary of the Socialist Union of Popular Forces (USFP), used a Sunday gathering of the party’s union cadres to demand that Rabat hand the matter over to prosecutors rather than let it fester as a war of press statements between coalition partners.
Lachkar argued that recent remarks from senior government officials — remarks that touched on alleged mismanagement of public money — had crossed a threshold where political sparring was no longer an adequate response. « Data of this kind calls for legal channels, not talking points, » he told the gathering, pressing for a formal judicial inquiry to verify claims that have circulated for days.
He also took aim at the mutual finger-pointing now consuming Morocco’s ruling coalition, asking pointedly why these files were suddenly resurfacing when the very ministries involved had been run by the same coalition partners for years. According to Lachkar, some officials have spoken of irregularities running into billions of dirhams — a figure, he said, serious enough to warrant courts rather than communiqués.
On the substance, the USFP leader repeated a position his party has held since the dispute erupted: subsidies should flow directly to Moroccan farmers and livestock breeders, not toward livestock-import channels that he says have siphoned off much of the benefit. He singled out the sheep headcount declarations submitted around Eid al-Adha, arguing that the sharp rise in registered flock sizes raises real questions about the accuracy of the data — and, by extension, about how much aid certain beneficiaries actually received.
The row traces back to late August, when a leaked audio recording attributed to House Speaker Rachid Talbi Alami, a senior National Rally of Independents (RNI) figure, laid bare tensions inside the coalition. Budget Minister Fouzi Lekjaa has since pushed back repeatedly, insisting his department only releases funds and has no say over import operations or beneficiary lists, while RNI figures such as Mohamed Aujar have accused rivals of exploiting the file for political gain. With legislative elections approaching, lawmakers are now pushing for a parliamentary fact-finding commission, turning a subsidy dispute into one of the more combustible issues of the campaign trail.
