Amina Bouayach | |
|---|---|
 | |
| President of theNational Human Rights Council | |
| Assumed office 6 December 2018 | |
| Preceded by | Driss el-Yazami |
| Personal details | |
| Born | (1957-12-10)10 December 1957 (age 67) Tétouan, Morocco |
| Occupation | Human rights activist, diplomat |
Amina Bouayach (born 10 December 1957) is a Moroccanhuman rights activist. Since December 2018, Bouayach has served as the president of theMoroccan National Human Rights Council.[1] In this role, she affirmed in 2019 that there are no "political prisoners in Morocco."[2]
In 2006, she became the first woman elected as president of a major NGO in Morocco.[3]
As president of the Moroccan Organization for Human Rights (OMDH),[4] Bouayach worked on major human rights issues in her native country such astorture,refugees' andmigrants' rights,women's rights, human trafficking, individual rights, and theabolition of the death penalty.[5] During theArab Spring she traveled on official missions toTunisia andLibya.[6]
Bouayach was elected vice-president, then secretary general of theInternational Federation for Human Rights in 2010 and 2013 respectively.[7] Then, in 2016, Bouayach served as the Moroccan Ambassador toSweden andLatvia.[8]
Bouayach was born inTetouan on 10 December 1957[3] to a well-known Riffian family fromBni Bouayach. Her family came from theAit Ouriaghel tribe who were driven out of theRif mountains by the Spanish occupation.[9] Her father, Hammadi Bouayach, was alawyer, a political activist, thinker and a law professor at the University ofRabat, of which he became dean. He was one of the very few selected to be part of a mission to study abroad inCairo andParis by Mohamed El-Mekki Naciri. Her grandfather was consideredAbdelkrim el-Khattabi's right hand and most loyal general during theRif War.[10]
She has a master's degree in economics fromMohammed V University in Rabat.[4]
Bouayach's work as an activist began in the 1980s, inspired by movements against the death penalty in South America.[11] Many years later, she told a journalist in an interview that her advocacy for political prisoners began when her ex-husband, a Marxist–Leninist activist who she had married at a very young age, was arrested in 1976.[10]
Bouayach started defending Moroccan political prisoners during the "Years of Lead," a period of political oppression and state violence in the 1970s and 1980s under King Hassan II.[12] She was a founding member in 1998 of the Moroccan Organisation for Human Rights (OMDH),[13] which in 1993 criticized the execution of a high-ranking security official. In 1994 the OMDH declared the death penalty a serious violation of human rights, and in that year, a royal decree of amnesty spared all death row inmates in Morocco.[11]
Bouayach spent two years working with renowned sociologistFatema Mernissi to improve women's rights, especially for Muslim Women;[4] and has published numerous articles on the subject in Arabic, French, English and Spanish.[citation needed]
Professionally, she has held many political positions, most notably as a member in the cabinet of former Prime ministerAbderrahmane Youssoufi from 1998 to 2002,[3] and as a member of the Consultative Commission onConstitutional Reform, appointed byKing Mohammed VI in 2011 during theArab Spring. For her notable contributions to the Moroccan Constitution, she was awarded theOrder of the Throne byKing Mohammed VI.[4]
She has worked closely with theUnited Nations, theAfrican Union and the Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Network. In 2006 she became head of the Moroccan Organization of Human Rights (OMDH), a major NGO.[4][5]
She was one of the first human rights figures to visit Tunisia after the abdication of former Tunisian presidentZine El Abidine Ben Ali, and to Libya after the disappearance of former Libyan presidentMuammar Gaddafi. She was and remains very active in the regional group for the reform of theArab States League.[14]
Amina Bouayach was a member of theArab Organization for Human Rights and the group of experts in strategic studies in the region of the Office of theUnited Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights.[6]
In 2014, she held the position of principal coordinator of African NGOs during the African Summit inAddis Ababa.[14]
On 13 October 2016, she became Ambassador ofMorocco toSweden[15] andLatvia. She said farewell to Latvia on February 15, 2019 to take her new appointment at the CNDH.[16]
On 6 December 2018, Amina Bouayach was appointed by KingMohammed VI of Morocco as president of theNational Council for Human Rights in Morocco.[17]
ForWorld Women's Day 2019, she launched a national campaign for the abolition of underage marriage in Morocco.[18] She has since launched several campaigns in defense of victims of sexual violence and harassment.[19]
CNDH and its president Amina Bouayach received heavy criticism in 2019 after her statement that theHirak Rif prisoners were not political detainees, specifically that there are no "political prisoners in Morocco", but rather "prisoners who have been arrested for their participation in demonstrations or violence produced during demonstrations." The Hirak Rif (popular movement) began in 2016 after Mohcine Fikri, a local fishmonger, was crushed to death in a garbage truck while attempting to retrieve his confiscated goods.[25][2]
Later on, in a 400-page report created by CNDH and presented by Bouayach, the conclusions concurred with the judiciary charges against the prominent leader of the protests,Nasser Zefzafi, who was sentenced to 20 years of prison. Zefzafi was arrested after insulting a local imam at a sermon and condemned by the judiciary for inciting protests that had turned to "severe violence", including the arson of a residence shelteringAl Hoceima police. This position by CNDH and Bouayach was criticized by several Moroccan rights groups and activists.[25]
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