Islamic parties dominate cities in local elections

Описание: (6 Sep 2015) LEAD IN:
The results of Morocco's local and regional elections have been announced.
The ruling Islamist party has dominated the regional vote while the opposition PAM has done well at the local level.
STORY-LINE:
The count begins.
A polling bureau chief empties ballot papers onto a table.
The votes have been cast in Morocco's local and regional elections.
Some 30,000 local council seats and 700 regional council seats have been contested by more than 140,000 candidates from at least 30 parties.
Opposition group the Authenticity and Modernity Party (PAM) is celebrating after it came first in the local councils with 6,655 seats, a 21 percent share.
It secured 132 seats in the regional elections.
It's General Secretary puts the success down to years of preparation.
"Not only have we maintained our results but we improved them because we added some 600 new seats to our tally compared to what we managed to have in the previous elections," says Ilyas El Omari, who is also chairman of the PAM national elections committee.
"We have been preparing for these municipal and regional elections since 2012 because we were expecting them to be held in 2013 or 2014 at the latest," he adds.
But the real winner is the Islamist Party for Justice and Development which took the most seats in the regional councils with 25 percent of the total.
However, it fell short in the local councils, which are weighted towards rural areas.
The PJD, as the Islamist party is known, is mainly strong in the cities among educated voters and took control of councils in the main cities of Casablanca, Tangiers, Rabat, Fez and Agadir with just under 16 percent of seats - three times what it won in 2009 local contests.
It's the ruling party of Morocco and says voters have supported it in these elections because of its work in governing country.
"When we moved to the government, we worked. Our actions were welcomed by the citizens," says Abdelilah Benkirane, General Secretary of the PJD.
"Our people who worked at the local level showed their electorate that they were clean and fair and they are doing their best," he adds.
But the vote has been a big disappointment for the Socialist Union of Popular Forces (USFP).
In the local elections the party's share fell from 3,200 seats to 2,656 seats.
And it took just 23 seats in the regional contest with a tiny 3.39 percent of the votes.
Its General Secretary blames the electoral system and government for his party's lacklustre performance.
"Would you believe that the electoral system was made to favour some candidates and some lists? After four years in power, the government did not announce the details until the last few days," says Driss Lachgar.
The ministry reported a turnout of 53 percent.
The elections are seen as an important test of the popularity of the Islamist-led government which came to power after the pro-democracy demonstrations of the 2011 Arab Spring and face new parliamentary elections next year.

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