Moroccan parliamentary election, 2002

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27 September 2002

2007 →

All 325 seats to the Assembly of Representatives of Morocco
163 seats were needed for a majority

	First party	Second party	Third party

Leader	Abderrahmane Youssoufi	Abbas El Fassi	Abdelkrim al-Khatib
Party	USFP	Istiqlal	PJD
Last election	57	32	-
Seats won	50	48	42
Seat change	7	16	42
Percentage	15.38%	14.77%	12.92%
Swing	1.48%	0.97%	12.92%

Prime Minister before election

Abderrahmane Youssoufi
USFP

Elected Prime Minister

Driss Jettou
Independent

Abderrahmane Youssoufi
USFP

Driss Jettou
Independent

The 2002 Moroccan parliamentary election was held in Morocco on 27 September 2002. The election was the first since King Mohammed VI of Morocco had come to the throne in 1999 and international observers saw it as a test of his commitment to democracy. The election saw an Islamist party the Justice and Development Party make strong gains but the outgoing government kept a majority in the Assembly of Representatives.

The election took place under a revised voting system in which 325 deputies were elected from 91 constituencies. The new rules guaranteed women would be at least 10% of the Assembly of Representatives by reserving 30 seats for them. In total 5,865 candidates from 26 political parties and 5 lists of independents stood in the election including 965 female candidates. With many voters illiterate, each party had different symbols such as a car, alarm clock, horse, wasp or lamp which were printed on the ballot paper for voters to select.

Even the Prime Minister, Abderrahmane Youssoufi, agreed that previous elections in Morocco had been rigged but the new King Mohammed VI had pledged that this election should be kept free. Indeed, observers at polling stations reported that the election was much cleaner than previous elections. The campaign itself was low key with a low turnout expected. Issues raised in the campaign included rising prices, a salary freeze, economic stability and improvements in education and public health. Poverty and unemployment, combined with the powers which the King had reserved to himself meant many people saw little reason to vote.

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Wikipedia