Committee for the Abolition of Illegitimate Debt

To understand this struggle, we must contextualise it within the neoliberal violence imposed on Moroccan workers for decades. These workers were exploited first by a powerful oligarch, Tazi Al-Alami, who served as Minister of Industry under the El Youssfi government; he employed children as young as 12 in his factory, forcing them to hide in boxes when clients visited. These children slept in the factory sometimes, were denied education, and some of them never learnt to read or write. This is capitalism, where the future of a nation can be sacrificed for profits. Living under it is not a joke, and if it were, it would be a cruel one; we literally have ministries of industry, commerce, and investment, but never a “Ministry of the Working Class”. In other words, we only have mechanisms put in place by the exploitative system to keep the wheel of production turning and to make sure profit Profit The positive gain yielded from a company’s activity. Net profit is profit after tax. Distributable profit is the part of the net profit which can be distributed to the shareholders. always comes before human needs.These women, now adults, serve as a stark critique of Morocco’s neoliberal system. Denied basic education, they became aware of their class position through daily exploitation. They self-organised early on under the CDT (Confédération démocratique du travail), launching strikes and protests that gradually forced their workplace to become one where exploitation had to at least mimic humane work conditions, such as having wages paid on time, access to social security, and paid maternity leave. It was a rare success; 500 workers, over 90% of them women, demanding and securing rights in an export-orientated sector where most women are non-unionised, underpaid, and treated as disposable tools… The Sicome case is very unique in this regard.

The normal working conditions in Morocco’s textile sector are marked by low wages, long hours, poor health and safety standards, a near-total absence of social protections, and unsafe environments with little to no job security. Many factories fail to comply with even the minimum legal standards, exposing workers to physical and psychological harm, as if it were necessary to break the law to break the worker, who is not even protected by Morocco’s labour medicine law, which remains outdated and ill-equipped to address the realities of modern industrial labour, offering little to no protection against exploitation.

From a historical point of view, these are the perfect conditions for workers to build class consciousness or even riot, and yet we have less than 10% of the unionised textile workforce in Morocco.On the other hand, we have the CGEM (Confédération Générale des Entreprises du Maroc), a union of employers that allows them to collectively fight for their right to suppress ours. Within this union stands AMITH (Association Marocaine des Industries du Textile et de l’Habillement), representing the interests of textile and garment industry employers. The nature of these interests is evident.

Eventually even their achievement was crushed. The company’s owners began dismantling SICOME as early as 2010. Workers were left technically unemployed for weeks on and off. In 2013, the owners sold the company’s five-hectare property to the CEO’s brother and rented it back for 100,000 MAD/month. They created a new company, SICOMEK, using the same headquarters but with a much lower capital: 100,000 MAD versus 5.48 million MAD. In 2014, SICOME sold its transport vehicles to another company owned by the CEO, Alliance, who was also working in the textile sector. They quietly transferred workers and staff there without their consent. They discovered in 2016 that they had not received their social security payments, despite ongoing wage deductions. This was no accident; it was a premeditated liquidation strategy. SICOME accumulated debt, ceased paying salaries, and closed its doors on November 2^nd, 2017. The owners disappeared, triggering protests. In July 2018, a partial reopening occurred, funded by a 4 million MAD state subsidy, but the cycle repeated. The factory finally closed on November 16^th, 2021, again with unpaid wages, unpaid social security, and more debt. As of May 2025, some workers are still paying off debts incurred during that time.Such behaviour is unethical, but somehow it is legal. The same people who did this are still active in the textile industry, exploiting young, non-unionized female workers. What kind of system allows for such impunity? Even the state is encouraging this model by privatising education, healthcare, and transportation, forcing workers on their knees to meet the most basic needs while repressing unions and criminalising strikes.

Women, especially working-class women, are expected to serve the economy under inhuman working conditions; they are expected to keep pumping the market with more working force, produce huge amounts of unpaid labour while being systematically denied proper access to public services that would allow them to do their jobs without being crushed under the weight of exhaustion or trapped in the cycle of debt they’re forced to enter just to survive, and help the market survive by keeping the production going. Today, striking is practically illegal. The unions caught the bureaucracy infection and became weak. Working-class consciousness is undermined by a political environment where class struggle is painted as illegitimate, and international financial institutions are putting us on the highway, in reverse, to a dystopian world the classic slave owner would’ve loved to live in and stop caring about their property’s (the slaves) ability to produce because it would be cheaper to change them than it is to fix a machine.

The solidarity caravan held on April 27^th broke this silence. Multiple human rights associations, student groups, political parties, and independent activists… joined from across the country. They raised Palestinian flags, pictures of political prisoners, and social demands, especially the 20 February one, “FREEDOM, DIGNITY, SOCIAL EQUITY Equity The capital put into an enterprise by the shareholders. Not to be confused with ’hard capital’ or ’unsecured debt’. ,” asserting the deep connection between the global fight against imperialism and the local class struggle. Outsiders might view this as vague, but in truth, it is sharp and clear; our fight is one. One struggle is caused by one common enemy: the oligarchy, the system upheld by the World Bank World Bank
WB The World Bank was founded as part of the new international monetary system set up at Bretton Woods in 1944. Its capital is provided by member states’ contributions and loans on the international money markets. It financed public and private projects in Third World and East European countries.

It consists of several closely associated institutions, among which :

1. The International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD, 189 members in 2017), which provides loans in productive sectors such as farming or energy ;

2. The International Development Association (IDA, 159 members in 1997), which provides less advanced countries with long-term loans (35-40 years) at very low interest (1%) ;

3. The International Finance Corporation (IFC), which provides both loan and equity finance for business ventures in developing countries.

As Third World Debt gets worse, the World Bank (along with the IMF) tends to adopt a macro-economic perspective. For instance, it enforces adjustment policies that are intended to balance heavily indebted countries’ payments. The World Bank advises those countries that have to undergo the IMF’s therapy on such matters as how to reduce budget deficits, round up savings, enduce foreign investors to settle within their borders, or free prices and exchange rates.

and its local enforcers.

On Labour Day, the same solidarity was shown, not by the traditional union apparatuses nor to them. It was shown by students, independent citizens, and some principled political currents. The CDT participated in the march that took place in front of the Sicome-Sicomek workers. It marched on its own, having only people wearing its logo behind its banner. The workers, on the other hand, mobilised a broader and truer solidarity—a living union of people brought together by a real struggle—teaching us yet again that a union is neither a name nor a legal status and absolutely not a logo; it is the collective will of those who resist together.

In fact, the CDT bureaucracy has actively betrayed these workers. It is suing them for daring to ask for their rights, a piece of news so ridiculous, not even The Onion can come up with a title more satiric. The so-called “union” turned against its base, exposing the rot of bureaucratic unionism. Legal suits came not only from the union but also from the former employer, which is no surprise. What’s more alarming is the state targeting people who show support. Yacine Bouamlate, for example, is now facing legal charges simply for publicly standing with striking workers. His activism made him a target, proving that even basic solidarity is enough to trigger state repression when it threatens the system.

For merely taking part in distributing those flyers, one of the activists now faces prosecution. The authorities accuse him of incitement and of calling for an unauthorised protest—charges rooted not in violence or disruption but in the basic act of showing up for others. This is how the system operates: not only does it crush labour, but it also targets those who dare express solidarity with it.

During the protest, the workers raised the slogan “يا بوخلفة يا حقير، عاقت بيك الجماهير”, naming and shaming the CDT’s own general secretary, whose careerism has only served to preserve bourgeois order.

It must be noted that the workers wore and raised the union flags and slogans, sending a clear message that they still believe in their union; they only criticise the manner in which it operates, where the so-called union defends its own interests, even if it means casting workers out to fend for themselves in the rain! This clearly applies to the Sicome-Sicomek labourers.

It seems we’ve somehow forgotten the basic definition of a union, which is a group of workers who come together to support one another and stand up for their rights collectively. Now who does that describe? Is it the genuine workers or the bourgeoisie’s corrupted apparatus that has eroded people’s trust in unions and prevented the awakening of working-class awareness? Many see unions as mere tools of manipulation, and sadly, the experiences of the Sicome-Sicomek workers validate that view. Yet, through betrayal and abandonment, these women stand firm in their solidarity, proving that while unions are essential to the workers’ struggle, they must first be reclaimed from the bureaucratic parasites that corrupt them. That’s the reality we’ve ended up with, not because collective power is a failed idea – no one can deny that without our brain and muscle, not a single wheel will turn – but because we haven’t yet built a new system of collective defence that truly puts people first. Instead, we’ve allowed structures to form that place little parasites at the head of the union, serving the big parasite (the bourgeoisie) and controlling the workers in the name of representation. These are unions in name only, where each group defends its own narrow interests, showing little to no solidarity with other just causes.

We must reject this logic. The working class is one. We are all victims of the same machine. The capitalists are the enemy, and our only chance lies in unity, not division. We will not lose our chains by begging. We will only lose them by breaking them together. And the tools to do so are in the hands of the union.