SlateAfrique.com has just published an article on Tamazight, the other name for the Berber language. Tamazight actually refers to a group of languages present in the whole of North Africa (Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, Niger, Mauritania, Mali, and Burkina Faso), which includes among other variants, Kabyle, Tuareg Tamasheq or Rifian, to name the most famous.

Slateafrique.com mentions king Mohammed VI’s address on March 9, when he announced a reform of the Constitution and acknowledged the plurality of the Moroccan identity, united and enriched with the diversity of its tributaries, at the heart of which lies Amazighity, the common heritage of all Moroccans. Something for Berber speakers, the country’s majority, to look up to.

Later, on June 12, a constitutional reform project was handed to the king by a commission run by constitutionalist Abdelatif Mennouni, in which the clear recommendation was to recognize two official languages for Morocco, Tamazight and Arabic, and to vote an Organic Law at Parliament to define the stages and terms of an official use of the Amazigh language in teaching, the media, and administration.

The battle isn’t necessarily won yet, however: serious oppositions remain, as describes MP Abdellatif Ouammou, member of the Party of Progress and Socialism (PPS): The new Constitution will be brought to a referendum. We must focus our efforts into raising awareness and outreach towards the Moroccan people because many of them, including nationalist intellectuals, will be displeased and advocate for Morocco having only one official language.

Formalization advocates are satisfied but do not claim victory, fearing a second-rate sort of formalization, unfollowed by practical measures. Meryem Demnati, researcher at the Institut Royal de la Culture Amazighe (IRCAM), calls for the language to be taught to all the Moroccan people, Arabic and Berber-speaking, and not only to the speakers of Tamazight alone: They claim that our language is only spoken in the highlands, and forget that Casablanca is the largest Berber city in the country.

Slateafrique.com concludes on a parallel with Algeria, another country including a very strong Berber-speaking component, where the identity struggle reaches back to over 60 years. According to political sources, the State will not take after its Morocaon neighbor and rival. To which Bouamara Kamel, professor at the Amazigh department of the university of Bejaïa, agrees, judging that the Algerian State isn’t as honest or clever as Makhzen is!

Be that as it may, the referendum takes place this Friday, July 1st, for or against the new Constitution and its clauses in favor of the Berber language. Results should be out by mid-July.

Read full article here

Video presentation of the Tuareg’s Tamasheq language