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Morocco: Early Results Indicate Islamists Ahead
[Tripoli Post] Election results for the first 50 seats in Morocco's 395-seat parliament early Saturday suggest a moderate Islamist party is taking 40 percent of the vote according to the state's news agency.According to the new constitution, the party with the most seats in the popular European tourist destination and US ally that suffers from high unemployment and widespread poverty, it gets first crack at forming a new government. It would also appear to confirm a trend of victories by Islamist parties in elections prompted by the Arab Spring, following Ennahda's win last month in Tunisia. Like the rest of the region, Morocco was swept by pro-democracy protests decrying widespread corruption, which the king attempted to defuse over the summer by ordering the constitution modified to grant more powers to the Parliament and prime minister and then holding elections a year earlier. The government announced a 45-percent turnout in Friday's contest, slightly more than legislative elections in 2007, when 19 percent of ballots were invalid.. A coalition of eight liberal, pro-government parties led by Finance Minister Salaheddine Mezouar have amassed roughly the same amount of seats as the Islamists in the preliminary results announced, but it is the largest single party that forms the government. Posted by: Fred 2011-11-27 |
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