Rabat: The First president of the Court of Accounts, Zineb El Adaoui, stressed on Tuesday the importance of strengthening the attractiveness of territories and called for the adoption of a national land strategy, as well as the establishment of incentive mechanisms to train, attract, and retain skills across all territories, while ensuring their professional stability. Referring to the Court of Accounts’ significant actions before both Houses of Parliament, El Adaoui underscored the importance of making land available in order to stimulate and attract private investment, both in urban and rural areas.
According to Agence Marocaine De Presse, El Adaoui emphasized the need for an integrated national land strategy to ensure coherence among the interventions of various stakeholders and to facilitate investors’ access to land. This strategy should include mechanisms for recovering misappropriated or illegally exploited public real estate and properties, along with coercive measures when necessary. She highlighted the energy potential of territories, noting their attractiveness for promising investments like renewable energies, which, despite comprising 45.3% of the electricity mix in 2024, only contributed 26.7% to national electricity production, thus maintaining reliance on fossil fuels.
El Adaoui reiterated the Court of Accounts’ recommendation to accelerate investments in solar energy and the electricity transmission network, specifically mentioning the “Electric Highway” project linking Dakhla to Casablanca. She also addressed water resource management, advocating for continued rationalization and combat against irresponsible behaviors, irrespective of regional abundance or scarcity.
Human resources were identified as a crucial component for the success of development programs. El Adaoui stressed the need for an integrated national strategy to upgrade the territorial civil service, taking into account the spatial, social, and economic specificities of each region. This strategy should involve institutional contractual arrangements between the State and regions regarding human capital management, considering the competencies of territorial authorities within the framework of advanced regionalization.
El Adaoui further recommended enhancing the attractiveness of the territorial civil service through incentive mechanisms to draw in skills and ensure professional stability, incorporating these into a basic statute for the relevant employee categories. She underscored the importance of collective action among institutional stakeholders through cooperation, pooling, and exchange of expertise to effectively implement strategic programs and projects at local and territorial levels.
Addressing human capital training, El Adaoui mentioned the City of Trades and Skills, a key component of the vocational training roadmap, which suffered delays, as only seven out of 12 institutions were operational by the 2024-2025 academic year, covering 74% of the planned capacity. She also highlighted the role of the Office for Vocational Training and Job Promotion (OFPPT) in meeting sectoral needs, advocating for a contractual mechanism with the State to align objectives, resources, and results with territorial and sectoral dimensions, ensuring funding and monitoring of roadmap projects.