Rabat — With Morocco’s next electoral rendezvous drawing closer, the Party of Progress and Socialism (PPS) is betting on social policy to win over voters. Secretary-General Mohamed Nabil Bennabdellah unveiled a broad package of commitments this weekend, positioning purchasing power and social protection at the heart of his party’s campaign pitch.
The headline promise is direct: a monthly allowance of up to 1,000 dirhams for households already receiving social aid, paired with a hike in the minimum retirement pension to 3,000 dirhams. On healthcare, the PPS pledges to bring nearly 8.5 million uninsured Moroccans into the national coverage system, and wants the job done within just two years, a tight timeline that signals how urgent the party considers the issue.
Employment sits at the center of the platform. The PPS is promising 165,000 new positions in education and healthcare over five years, part of a broader target of one million actual jobs created over the same period, an ambitious figure in a country where youth unemployment remains a persistent source of anxiety for households.
Rural Morocco was not left out. Bennabdellah described farmers as facing difficult conditions and called for a deep overhaul of agricultural policy, with two goals in mind: shielding producers from economic shocks and reinforcing the kingdom’s food security, which recent years of drought have repeatedly tested.
These social commitments form one pillar of a five-point platform the PPS is campaigning on. The others include forming a strong and accountable government, cleaning up public life by tackling conflicts of interest and corruption, building a productive economy, strengthening democratic rights and freedoms, and putting citizens back at the center of development policy.
To lend weight to the promises, Bennabdellah stressed the need for an ethical pact binding officials and elected representatives to the public, a clear attempt to preempt the usual criticism that campaign programs rarely survive contact with governing realities once ballots are counted.
Whether this social platform, generous as it reads on paper, can withstand the budgetary trade-offs of actual governance remains an open question. The PPS will need to convince an electorate that has grown increasingly focused on delivered results rather than campaign promises.
