One year has passed since the Moroccan elections, but it is not sufficient to highlight any successes or failures. However, there are indications to both a secret and a public conflict between those parties that wish to see this experience proceed until its natural end and those that wish to put sticks in the wheels. The elections ended with the access of the Islamic Justice and Development party to power. None of the other parties, including the opposition factions, took the trouble to ride an opposite wave because this coincided with the momentum of the Arab spring on one hand; and because the voting ballots settled the debate on the other. The fairness that prevailed during the past year is now gone. The parties and movements are revisiting their calculations, as if they had a wakeup call and are now emerging from a state of absent-mindedness. The experience that brought everybody together, a first in the history of Morocco, soon revealed the possibility of breaking away. The restlessness of the governmental coalition indicates that the coalition's euphoria has come to an end. The confrontation of Benkirane led by the opposition on the occasion of the budget revision was not an interesting event. The interesting and surprising part consisted of the emergence of opposing positions from within the government's coalition. We do not understand how the majority parliamentary blocs started to make suggestions to amend the draft budget, although they could have done so within the cabinet rather than through the parliament. The most plausible reason is that the government allowed its parliamentary arms the chance to take a step further away from the power of political decision making. One of the reasons of this stalemate could consist of the desire to contain the present restlessness, especially in light of the growing criticism concerning the power monopolization by the Islamic party's ministers. This could be like a necromancy session aimed at preparing some kind of a surprise. However, the wind preceding the storm usually comes in specific seasons. Even as the Moroccan skies are dark and cloudy, the political weather predictors can guess if there will be rain and how heavy the rain will be. Clearly, the change witnessed by the Independence Party through the access of Hamid Shobat – a unionist – to power on the head of this party will have repercussions on the future of the governmental coalition. Indeed, this unionist negotiator does not leave a room without obtaining a tangible result. But in case he fails to achieve this for some reason, then taking to the street becomes warranted. The public servants' salary cuts that were passed by the Benkirane cabinet to limit the unionist strikes will not have any effect on the political negotiations. The cabinet is unlikely to induce cuts targeting its partisan sides. It may only change some names or faces. People's attention is also focused on the upcoming conference of the Socialist Union Party since it will affect in one way or another the path of the possible alliances in the opposition camp. Most of the competing candidates for the leadership of that camp showed a tendency to cling to their posts. Some even went to the extent of betting on the possibility of attracting the Independence Party to the opposition camp. This means that the conference participants will not just limit themselves to consolidating the party's identity – knowing that the party considers the government to be a conservative one – and to proceeding with their leftist tendencies. They will go beyond that and try to rock the political scene. Do they wish to become the main competitor of the Islamic party, considering that the two parties' differences sometimes reach the extent of a clash? Or will they pave the way for building a new alliance, one that takes into consideration the fact that the Justice and Development party had supported the Socialist party in its first power rotation experience? There are ethical issues that also control the stands in addition to the regional givens and the relations with the European Union, especially that the Hollande-led Socialist France is part of the equation. The year that is about to end was not just constituted of pros and cons. It was rather like a series of experimental steps that, according to the governmental coalition, were heading to the right direction despite some reservations. However, the opposition described these steps as taking the country towards the unknown. In both cases, everyone's attention is now focused on the next stop, that of the municipal elections and the elections of the counselors' council, which are planned to be conducted during the next year. The importance of this upcoming deadline lies in the fact that the system of the sides allows voters more opportunities at running the local affairs. This is below an autonomous system and above the concept of decentralization. The new constitution voted by the Moroccans at the height of the Arab Street revolutions confined the ability to overthrow the cabinet to the parliament alone without the counselors. Thus, the mere granting of some of the non strategic governmental jurisdictions to lateral sides will represent a major development. Most likely, the conflict within and around the cabinet will move to a different area even though politics are more alluring that looking into issues of development.
