Morocco: Moderate Islamists Claim Election Win
By RFE RL
(RFE/RL) — The Justice and Development Party (PJD) has claimed victory in Morocco’s first parliamentary election since pro-democracy protests earlier this year.
The PJD would be the second moderate Islamist party to lead a North African government, after Tunisia, since the start of the Arab Spring uprisings.
The PJD has said it will seek to force a majority in the 395-member party with three parties in the current governing coalition, including the left-wing Socialist Union of Popular Forces and the nationalist Istiqlal of Prime Minister Abbas Al Fassi.
Voter turnout was 45 percent despite calls by some campaigners to boycott the vote.
Like elsewhere in the Arab world, Moroccans took to the streets in the first half of 2011 calling for more democracy, and King Mohammed VI responded by amending the constitution and bringing forward elections.
But activists say that since then the government has grown less receptive to calls for reform.
Activists are calling for fresh nationwide protest on December 4.
