From the lies of “the Berber Dahir”: “racial discrimination” as a model

(On the anniversary of the “Berber Dahir” = May 16, 1930)

1. Necessary clarifications:

What we know about the “Berber Dahir”, as we learned it in school and read it in the history books of contemporary Morocco, is that this dahir is “a racist law that enacted an ethnic segregation among Moroccans on a racial basis, by racially separating the ‘Berbers’ from their Arab ‘brothers’”.

Let us then read the text of the dahir to find the articles and provisions that establish racial segregation between “Berber” Moroccans and “Arab” Moroccans. This segregation, as is well known, is a central element of the dahir, to the point that the “Latif” speaks of it alone and does not mention the other elements, such as Christianization, the return to paganism and the fight against Islam.

But when we read and reread the text of the dahir, in its original French version published in issue 918 of the Official Bulletin, dated May 30, 1930, and in its Arabic version published in issue 919 of the Official Bulletin, dated June 6, 1930, we find no explicit or even implicit indication that confirms or stipulates this segregation.

It is known that racial segregation laws, like those that prevailed in South Africa in the era of apartheid, are applied to an ethnic group with racial characteristics of its own. In the case at hand, that of the Imazighen and their racial separation from the “Arabs”, these characteristics consist in Amazigh racial belonging. The condition for applying this racist law that the dahir brought, according to the claims of the “National Movement”, would thus be to be “Amazigh”, that is, “Berber” as the partisans of the “Latif” call it, and it would not apply to other Moroccans, Jews or “Arabs”, because they have a non-Amazigh racial belonging. The criterion for applying this racist law is therefore possession of a particular characteristic, Amazigh racial belonging.

2. The criterion of the presence of “Berber customs”:

The dahir of May 16, 1930, which the “Latif-ists” distorted into a “Berber Dahir”, bears in its original French text the following title: “Dahir du 16 mai 1930 (17 Hija 1348) réglant le fonctionnement de la justice dans les tribus de coutume berbère non pourvues de mahkamas pour l’application du Chrâa” (Dahir of May 16, 1930 (17 Hija 1348) regulating the functioning of justice in the tribes of Berber custom not provided with mahkamas for the application of the Sharia).

A title that appears in the Arabic version in this form: “Noble dahir by which the current running of justice in the tribes with Berber customs, where there are no courts charged with applying the rules of the Sharia, becomes lawful in conformity with the principles in force”. Which can be rendered in today’s language as: (dahir of May 16… regulating justice in the tribes with Amazigh customs…).

Let us note well that the text, through its title, restricts the application of this law to “tribes with Berber customs”, not to “Berber tribes”. What is the difference, in terms of legal effects, between the two expressions?

Had the text used the expression “Berber tribes”, one could conclude that the “Berber tribes” alone, and no others, are concerned by this law and subject to it. The criterion adopted here, in “Berber tribes”, would then truly be a racial criterion tied to the condition of Amazigh racial belonging. But the text uses instead the expression “tribes with Berber customs”. Which means that the criterion for applying the dahir’s provisions is not Amazigh racial belonging but the existence and practice of Amazigh customs (Berber customs). It does not matter whether the tribe is Amazigh, Arab, Andalusian, Jewish or black African; what matters, as a condition for applying the provisions of this law, is that the tribe practices Amazigh customs and submits to them. It is known that Amazigh customs, even if their origins are Amazigh, were not applied by the Imazighen alone, but were practiced among Arab and Jewish groups depending on the regions where this custom was widespread and dominant. The dahir therefore concerns all the tribes in which Amazigh custom is applied, regardless of their racial and ethnic origin.

3. The principle of “territoriality” and not “personality”:

From the practice of Amazigh custom as a condition for applying the dahir in the tribes where this custom prevails, it follows that all persons residing or present on the territory of these tribes, the object of the dahir’s application, are also subject to its provisions and its requirements apply to them whatever their racial origins and ancestry. All this shows clearly that the principle governing the application of this law is the principle of the “territoriality of laws”, which means that the application of certain legal rules is limited to a defined territorial area (a region) regardless of the type of persons (Arabs, Imazighen, Jews, foreigners…) who are subject to these rules within that area. Which removes from this dahir any racist and racial character, because racist laws are governed by the principle of the “personality of laws”, which means that the application of certain legal rules is conditional on possessing racial characteristics inherent to the person subject to those rules regardless of the place (the territorial area) where he is, because these rules follow him wherever he goes, being tied to his person. This was the case of South Africa’s racist laws in the “apartheid” era, when these laws applied to the person with black skin whether he was in Pretoria, Johannesburg, Cape Town or Durban…

The practical proof that the application of the dahir of May 16, 1930 was not tied to the Amazigh person as an Amazigh is that the Imazighen who lived, for example, in the cities of Casablanca, Fez, Rabat, Marrakech and Oujda did not fall under the jurisdiction of the customary courts that the dahir in question organized, although they were Amazigh, but under the jurisdiction of the modern courts or the courts of the caids and pashas. Why? Because the jurisdiction of the customary courts is limited to a particular territorial area, as we have seen, and does not include the territory of these cities.

4. “Moroccans” and not “Berber Moroccans”:

Article 1 of the dahir says, in its French version: “Dans les tribus de Notre Empire […] la répression des infractions commises par des sujets marocains…” (In the tribes of Our Empire […] the repression of offences committed by Moroccan subjects…), which the Arabic text rendered as: “Offences committed by Moroccans in the tribes with Berber customs…”. Whether we translate the expression sujets marocains as “Moroccan subjects” or are content with the word “Moroccans” as the Arabic text did, it is clear, leaving no room for any ambiguity or interpretation, that the provisions of the dahir of May 16, 1930 apply to all Moroccans present in the areas of Amazigh custom, and do not single out the category of Imazighen alone by virtue of their Amazigh racial identity. Had the legislator’s intention been this racial specification, he would have used the expression that conveys it, namely “Sujets marocains berbères”, in Arabic: “the Berber Moroccans”. This is further confirmation that the scope of application of the dahir is not specific persons but specific territorial areas, whether the person present in those areas is of Arab, Amazigh or Jewish racial belonging.

Article 6 clarifies this matter further when it says, in the French text: “Les juridictions françaises […] sont compétentes pour la répression des crimes commis en pays berbère, quelle que soit la condition de l’auteur du crime” (The French courts […] are competent for the repression of crimes committed in Berber country, whatever the status of the perpetrator of the crime). And in the Arabic text: “The French courts […] have jurisdiction over the repression of crimes committed in the Berber districts (plural of nahiya, meaning an area), whatever the status of the perpetrator of the crime”.

5. Removal of the qualifier “Berber” without affecting the content of the customary rules:

After the uproar staged by the partisans of the “Latif” following the issuing of the customary courts dahir of May 16, 1930, which they called the “Berber Dahir”, the protectorate authorities realized that these people had exploited the “Berber” qualifier attached to the word “customs” in the text of the May 16 dahir, to use it as a justification and “proof” that this dahir, which organizes the customary courts, is indeed a “Berber dahir” aiming at racial segregation between Arabs and “Berbers”, based on the “Berber” qualifier that appears in it. That is why the protectorate authorities decided, in all the legislative texts later issued on the same subject, Amazigh custom, to remove not only the words “Berber” and “Berbers”, because of the ethnic and racial meanings they may evoke, but even the word “tribe” and “tribes” present in the dahir of May 16, 1930 and earlier dahirs, to prevent any ethnic and racial interpretation that this word might also suggest, and to block the way for the malicious partisans of the “Latif”, so that they would not use these words to manipulate the content of the legislative texts and claim that they establish racial segregation among the categories of Moroccan society. Thus we find that the dahir of April 8, 1934, which amends the dahir of May 16, 1930 (the “Berber Dahir”), says in its Article 1: “And that the jurisdictions […] apply in all criminal matters to the countries (meaning ‘areas’) of our happy kingdom known as the countries of custom or customs”. The same dahir expressed this in its original French version as: “La compétence […] est étendue, en toutes matières criminelles, aux pays de coutume de Notre Empire” (The jurisdiction […] is extended, in all criminal matters, to the countries of custom of Our Empire).

Had the principle of race been what was meant by the expression “Berber customs” in the text of May 16, 1930, instead of the principle of territoriality, the provisions and contents would have changed (becoming “non-racist” after having been “racist”) in the texts that did not use the word “Berber” while dealing with the question of custom and customary courts, such as the dahir of April 8, 1934 mentioned. Yet those provisions underwent no change in their content and applications as a result of dropping the “Berber” qualifier, apart from the amendments those provisions contained, and these amendments have no relation to keeping or dropping the “Berber” qualifier.

All this shows clearly that the field of application of the dahir of May 16, 1930 is territorial units (the principle of the territoriality of laws), and not ethnic groups with racial characteristics of their own. That is why the dahir of April 8, 1934 speaks of the “countries of custom”, to confirm that it concerns a geographical area with no relation to anything personal and ethnic.

6. Where is the “racial segregation” during the period of the dahir’s application?

We have therefore read the text of the dahir, in its French and Arabic versions, in search of articles and meanings that indicate racial segregation between Arabs and Imazighen, as the partisans of the “Latif” claimed, and we found neither presence nor trace of it. Which shows, clearly and glaringly, that pinning the charge of racial segregation on the dahir is another lie of the partisans of the “Latif”, added to their lies that make up the myth of the “Berber Dahir”.

Then, if it were true that the aim of this dahir was to establish racial segregation between Arabs and Imazighen, according to the lies of the partisans of the “Latif”, the effects of this segregation would have appeared during its period of application, which ran from 1930 until its abolition after independence (dahir of April 4, 1956 and dahir of August 25, 1956).

Throughout the period in which this dahir was in force, no change was observed, for racist reasons, in relations between Arabs and Imazighen. These relations, in terms of marriage and in-law ties, commercial dealings, travel to and from the Arab and Amazigh “areas” and residence in them, went on as they were before the dahir was issued. Which reveals the scale of the lies and slanders the partisans of the “Latif” invented against the Imazighen, against Moroccans and against history. And this is the only change the dahir made to the relationship between the “Arabs” and the Imazighen: the part of the “Arabs” who represented the “National Movement” became more mendacious and slanderous toward the Imazighen than they were before the dahir was issued. May God’s curse be on liars and impostors.

Arabic version | French version