Ministry of National Education and CNDH sign a framework agreement

Mr. Said Amzazi, Minister of National Education, Vocational Training, Higher Education and Scientific Research, and Mrs. Amina Bouayach, Chairperson of the National Human Rights Council (CNDH) signed an agreement to encourage initiatives aiming at promoting human rights reflexion in school and university milieu.

This event took place on Thursday 4 February 2021 at the Ministry's headquarters in Rabat, Morocco.

Mr. Driss Ouaouicha, Minister Delegate in charge of Higher Education and Scientific Research, general secretaries of the three departments at the ministry and the President of Mohammed V University in Rabat took part in this event.

This framework agreement aims to strengthen cooperation and partnership between universities and regional academies of education and training (AREFs), on the one hand, and the CNDH and its regional commissions, on the other hand. It also aims at promoting human rights culture  in the fields of school education, vocational training, higher education and scientific research. Besides, this agreement intends to promote equality culture education and combat discrimination, stereotypes and its negative representations.

In his statement, Mr. Said Amzazi said that this agreement is an explicit embodiment of a participatory approach aiming at strengthening human rights culture and reinforcing the sense of belonging to the country, citizenship, tolerance and decent living values for the learner. He also underlined that it is an embodiment of directives adopted by the ministry, in line with the Kingdom's Constitution and the UN recommendations, as well as the Royal orientations calling for placing human rights at the forefront of major determinants in people’s life.

For her part, Mrs. Amina Bouayach affirmed that the CNDH seeks that this agreement promotes human rights culture through the educational system in its pedagogical and cultural dimensions to be considered a norm for public action.

The areas of cooperation and partnership in this agreement include ways to strengthen the human rights system and social mediation in school and university spaces, as well as in vocational training institutions following a participatory approach.

This later aims to consolidate citizenship values ​​and reflexions related to human rights and spread tolerance/peaceful debate cultures through curricula and training processes. It also aims at training Moroccan and foreign staff and competencies in the field of human rights, as well as encouraging relevant cultural and artistic activities.

Launch of a series of meetings related to the project on “The Effectiveness of the Right to Health in Morocco: Towards a Health System Based on Human Rights Approach"

The National Human Rights Council (CNDH) will organize a national meeting to follow up on the outcomes of the seminar related to the launch of the project on "The Effectiveness of the Right to Health in Morocco: Towards a Health System Based on Human Rights Approach” and study the methodology to be adopted to organize a series of regional meetings.

This event will be held on Thursday 4 February 2021, starting from 10 am at the CNDH headquarters in Rabat, Morocco.

It is part of the completion of the implementation of the aforementioned project, which was initiated in October 2020 in partnership with the Konrad Adenauer Stiftung Foundation.

The program of this event includes the presentation of a report on the seminar related to the launch of the project; the proposed methodology for regional meetings; as well as the presentation of the regional meetings program and the appointment of representatives of the relevant authorities.

Professional bodies and NGO networks working in the field of health will participate in this meeting.

Mrs. Amina Bouayach, CNDH Chairperson, and Mr. Steffen Krüger, Director of the Konrad Adenauer Stiftung Foundation Bureau in Rabat, Morocco will participate in the opening session of this event.

As part of this project, the CNDH will organize a series of regional meetings between February and the end of June 2021. This series of meetings aim to involve local actors in proposing practical solutions that are consistent with regional and local specificities to contribute to promoting the right to health for all citizens.

This project seeks to enable all stakeholders, as well as national and international partners, to deliberate and share views on ways to reform the health system in Morocco, considering the obstacles preventing access to the right to health.

It also aims to advocate for the development of an integrated, inclusive and coherent national health strategy to guarantee the right to health for all, and face social/spatial inequalities that impede everyone's enjoyment of this right.

CNDH in Morocco and the National Human Rights Commission in Mauritania sign Memorandum of Understanding

The National Human Rights Council (CNDH) in Morocco and the National Human Rights Commission in Mauritania signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), on Sunday 31 January 2021, to establish and develop a framework for joint action, cooperation and consultation between the two parties.

This MoU was signed by Mrs. Amina Bouayach, CNDH Chairperson, and Mr. Ahmed Salem Ould Bouhbini, President of the National Human Rights Commission in Mauritania. It aims to achieve a joint vision to support initiatives aiming to promote and protect human rights in the two countries.

This memorandum stipulates to work on areas such as exchanging experiences/ knowledge to benefit from comparative experiences/ best practices; and strengthening bilateral dialogue to identify procedures that support the implementation of human rights as recognized internationally.

This memorandum also intends to reinforce capacities of members and staff of the two institutions, particularly concerning monitoring, handling and following-up complaints, interaction with the international and regional human rights system, elaboration of reports, communication and advocacy techniques, as well as participating in international, regional or national activities organized by each institution separately, etc.

The National Human Rights Commission in Mauritania was established in 2006. It is an independent advisory body that conducts missions related to protecting and promoting human rights. It is an institution accredited with "A" Status by the Global Alliance of National Human Rights Institutions (GANHRI).

Official launch of the joint project “Support for the NPM in Morocco” (2020-2023)

The National Human Rights Council (CNDH), the European Union (EU) and the Council of Europe (CoE) are jointly organizing, on January 26, 2021, from 10 am, a high-level online event to launch officially the project “Support to the National Preventive Mechanism against Torture (NPM) in Morocco”.

This project is launched by the EU and the CoE and implemented in partnership with the CNDH. It is implemented in the framework of the broader joint program between the EU and the CoE, entitled “Support to the National Preventive Mechanism against Torture and to the development of the key role of Parliament in Morocco” (2020-2023).

The 36-month project aims to support the implementation of Morocco's NPM. It is built on the CoE expertise and good practices identified during the implementation of joint programs between the EU and the CoE to support independent human rights bodies.

The project includes several axes, particularly: capacity building, exchanging experiences, searching for regional and international networking opportunities, and the publication of a prisoner's guide and a Moroccan penitentiary law manual, etc.

Dr. Mohamed Benajiba, Moroccan NPM Coordinator, will present the current context of the Moroccan NPM's operations at this online event.

Mr. Mohammed Ayat, Chairman of the United Nations Committee on Enforced Disappearances, will moderate a panel of experts on the challenges and concrete expectations related to the implementation of the NPM, with the contribution of Mr. Abdallah Ounnir, member of the Subcommittee on the Prevention of Torture (SPT).

Ms. Amina Bouayach, CNDH Chairperson, Ms. Verena Taylor, Director of the Office of the Directorate General of Programs (CoE), Mr. Alessio Cappellani, Deputy Head of the EU Delegation to Morocco, Mr. Christos Giakoumopoulos, Director General of Human Rights and Rule of Law (CoE, Strasbourg) will take part in the opening session of this event.

Online campaign to fight all forms of discrimination against women and girls with disabilities

The National Human Rights Council (CNDH) and its National Mechanism for the Protection of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities are launching, from December 30, 2020, an online campaign to fight all forms of discrimination against women and girls with disabilities.

This campaign is a response to the recommendation made by the United Nations Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) to conduct public awareness-raising campaigns to combat stereotypes, prejudices and myths about women and girls with disabilities.

It also aims to promote the rights of persons with disabilities, fight against all forms of gender- and disability-based discrimination, and raise public awareness on equality and respect for the rights of women and girls with disabilities.

“We are launching this online campaign to fight against compound and double discrimination suffered by women and girls with disabilities. We wish to highlight the value and the importance of the participation of this group in the management of public affairs and fight against stereotypes and prejudices which led to several forms of discrimination…,” declares Amina Bouayach, CNDH Chairperson.

The campaign particularly targets social media users (Facebook, Twitter, Youtube) which bring together several social categories. It will thus be conducted in Arabic (the dialect), Amazigh language and sign language.

Well-tailored and specific tools will be used to ensure the success of this awareness campaign. Video testimony by women and girls with disabilities, a video that provides advice and awareness-raising messages, and a video containing questions and answers on the disability issue will be disseminated.

The National Mechanism for the Protection of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities is in line with the expansion of the CNDH mandate. It is a redress mechanism. It receives complaints submitted directly by persons with disabilities who are victims of a violation of one of their rights, by their representatives or by its initiative.

"This mechanism also conducts all the necessary investigations for protecting and promoting the rights of persons with disabilities, taking into account the principles of equal opportunities and non-discrimination. It also ensures their integration into society and their full participation based on respect for individual independence and human dignity in addition to monitoring the implementation of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, etc.,” says Ms. Zhor Alhorr, Coordinator of the National Mechanism for the Protection of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.

Watch the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=isaWxFfO2c0&feature=youtu.be

Additional CNDH’s recommendation to the memorandum on the new development model: For a development that evokes history illuminations and memory preservation

The General Assembly of the National Human Rights Council (CNDH) approved, at its third regular session held on Friday 4 December 2020, an additional recommendation to its memorandum on “The effectiveness of rights and freedoms in Morocco... For a new social contract” related to evoking history and preserving memory in development. The CNDH intended to stress the importance of preserving memory and promoting Moroccan history in all its tributaries to elaborate a new development model.

In this recommendation, entitled "For a development that evokes history illuminations and memory preservation", the CNDH called for the necessity to focus on preserving memory and promoting Moroccan history with all its tributaries to elaborate the desired development model. It also underlined the importance to set up an integrated national plan to preserve memory with a legal basis that defines areas of intervention and ensures the consistency of programs to be implemented by various public institutions in this field.

Relating history illuminations, memory preservation and the new development model, several studies and researches were made. Within this context, development is considered a complex process. It is not limited to the narrow quantified economic perspective. Thus, the CNDH highlighted the importance to consider five dimensions when elaborating the new development model:
1- Economic and development questions and their measures and indicators as commonly known in the leading development experiences;
2- Vision driving national sphere and the need to establish it based on a positive perspective considering the position and the role of each region and integrating it in a sustainable development process;
3- Appreciation of cultural diversity, local specificity, and the memory of different regions composing the national entity;
4- Successful and positive appropriation of different stages of national history and the role of generations and regions in elaborating and forming its details and major features;
5- Considering history illuminations and memory preservation a fundamental part and a central component of  the process of preservation and development of the symbolic and immaterial capital.

To be noted, the memorandum submitted by the CNDH to the Special Committee on the Model of Development presented the CNDH’s vision of a development strategy. The CNDH's vision aims at considering the effectiveness of rights and freedoms a basic entry to guarantee the right to development. It also intends to make it at the core of the strategic choices for our country in the next phase. It is considered a translation of the CNDH strategy of action based on the effectiveness of rights and freedoms as approved by its General Assembly held in September 2019.

Download the additional recommendation to the CNDH’s memorandum (available in Arabic) 

Online seminar on Persons with Disabilities and Legal Capacity

The National Human Rights Council (CNDH) is organizing an online scientific seminar on Persons with Disabilities and the extent of the legal capacity, on Thursday, December 17, 2020, starting at 4 pm.

This seminar is part of the CNDH’s mandate relating to protecting the rights of persons with disabilities entrusted to the national mechanism for the protection of the rights of persons with disabilities. This event is also part of the implementation of the annual action program of the mechanism in its section related to following up and monitoring the implementation of the International Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD).

This event aims not only to contribute to public debate, but also to search for effective and reasonable entrances to achieve balance and complementarity between the need for states parties to acknowledge that persons with disabilities enjoy legal capacity on an equal basis with others (Paragraph 2 of Article 12 of the CRPD) and to take appropriate measures to provide them with the support they may need while exercising their capacity.

The program of this seminar includes two sessions that will address the following topics:
-Analytical reading of the provisions of Article 12 of the CRPD;
-Persons with disabilities and legal capacity in comparative law;
-Legal capacity for persons with disabilities in Moroccan legislation;
-The outcome of measures taken by Morocco to ensure that persons with disabilities enjoy legal capacity on an equal basis with others in all aspects of life.

This meeting will be broadcast live on the CNDH's Facebook page.

Ms. Amina Bouayach, CNDH Chairperson, along with Ms. Marie Louise Abomo, Commissioner of the Working Group on the Rights of Older Persons and People with Disabilities, the African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights; Ms. Catherine Pedreiros, representative of the Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, OHCHR; and Mr. Muhannad Alazzeh, Secretary-General of the Higher Council for the Rights of Persons with Disability in Jordan will take part in the opening of this seminar.

ONLINE TRAINING SESSION ON "PROMOTING THE RIGHT TO SEXUAL AND REPRODUCTIVE HEALTH OF WOMEN AND GIRLS THROUGH HUMAN RIGHTS MECHANISMS"

On Monday, December 14, 2020, Ms. Amina Bouayach, the President of the National Human Rights Council (CNDH) took part in a training session on “Promoting the right to sexual and reproductive health for girls and women through human rights mechanisms” organized by the Arab Institute for Human Rights, with the support of the United Nations Population Fund.

25 participants from regional human rights commissions benefited from this training session as part of enhancing the protection of sexual and reproductive rights and promoting their culture by adopting an approach based on human rights.

This online training session will be an opportunity to highlight the development of sexual and reproductive rights within the human rights system and its mechanisms; legislation and measures related to sexual and reproductive rights in Morocco; monitoring sexual and reproductive rights and defining indicators for monitoring; human rights mechanisms related to sexual and reproductive rights, etc.

On this occasion, Mrs. Bouayach shed light on the guide recently prepared by the CNDH on sexual and reproductive rights, in partnership with the United Nations Population Fund. This guide is a practical tool that provides all relevant parties with information on issues related to sexual and reproductive health, action plans adopted at the international level in this field, and the national framework that protects and guarantees these rights, including the constitution, applicable laws and regulations, public policies, and mechanisms of appeal and redress for women and girls victims of violation of their rights.

The CNDH Chairperson also underlined the aim of this guide which is to achieve two related processes. The first is to protect victims who submit complaints to the CNDH and its mechanisms, listen to them, and guide them to remedies. The second is related to promote legal processes and others to combat child marriage and violence against women and girls.

She also added that the guide addresses the goals set by the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development in the field of sexual and reproductive health that are directly related to achieving sustainable development for all. It also deals with special cases through practical exercises that will help the reader and the observer to deepen his/her understanding of the challenges and possible solutions.

The elaboration of this guide is part of various initiatives launched by the CNDH on the “Effectiveness of the right to health in Morocco: Towards a health system based on a human rights approach,” including sexual and reproductive health. It aims to discuss and exchange views on ways to reform the health system in Morocco, in light of obstacles that prevent access to the right to health. It also intends to advocate for the development of an integrated, inclusive and coherent national health strategy to guarantee the right to health for all and confronting social and spatial inequalities that impede everyone's enjoyment of this right.

Downlaod the statment of the CNDH Chairperson (available in Arabic)

Training workshops on human rights for detainees in Laayoune- Sakia El Hamra region

To commemorate the International Human Rights Day and on the occasion of the National Day of the Prisoner, the Regional Directorate for Prison Administration and Reintegration in Laayoune-Sakia El Hamra region, in partnership with the Regional Human Rights Commission in Laayoune-Sakia El Hamra region (CRDH), organizes training workshops on human rights for detainees in the aforementioned region during the period between December 14, 2020, and June 30, 2021.

These training workshops will be conducted by the CRDH in Laayoune- Sakia El Hamra region. They aim to highlight the importance of training and consecrate the reformist concept of the role of prison institutions, with a commitment to carry out procedural measures to implement the national action plan related to human rights. This could be achieved by strengthening programs of training and raising awareness of human rights values and mechanisms for protecting and promoting human rights.

These workshops also intend to consecrate tolerance, solidarity and equality values among the detainees by invoking peace, democracy, development, social justice and women's rights values as outlined in international and regional human rights instruments. Moreover, they aim at empowering detainees with mechanisms and methods for resolving conflicts peacefully and combating all forms of extremism, discrimination and hatred.

The first workshop will start on Monday, December 14, 2020, by using online communication tools, in respect of the precautionary measures imposed by the pandemic. Two training workshops will be organized every month until the end of June 2021. These workshops will be concluded with the establishment of the "Human Rights and Citizenship Club" In every prison institution in the region.

Postage stamp to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the National Human Rights Council

On the occasion of the 30th anniversary of the National Human Rights Council (CNDH), the Barid Al-Maghrib Group is launching, in partnership with the CNDH, on Thursday, December 10, 2020, a commemorative postage stamp to celebrate the efforts made by the CNDH as a pluralist and independent national institution in the field of the protection and promotion of human rights in our country for three decades.

"The establishment of the CNDH consolidates the Kingdom's commitment and its voluntary adherence in the international human rights system. It also reflects the unprecedented interaction between the supreme will of the State and the human rights and democracy movement on issues that preoccupied Moroccan society", declares Amina Bouayach, CNDH Chairperson.

Indeed, for three decades, through the Advisory Council on Human Rights (1990-2011) and the CNDH (since 2011), this institution has impacted major changes in human rights in our country, mainly at the legislative, institutional, legal and societal levels, etc.

Entitled "National Human Rights Council: 30 years", this stamp enhances the philatelic collection of Barid Al-Maghrib devoted to this theme since the independence, particularly the stamps dedicated to the 2nd edition of the World Human Rights Forum in Marrakech 2014, or the 70th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 2018.

Barid Al-Maghrib Press Contact
Mrs. ABDELLI Sahar
Phone: 060885458

CNDH Press Contact
Mr. BERDI Abdelghani
Phone: 0662762325