In an approach that has aroused many questions, the Le360 site published, this Tuesday, May 6, 2025, a long article entitled: “The Hubris … When Mostafa Terrab makes the first national wealth its thing”, tackling direct and unique to the President and CEO of the Chérifien des Phosphates Office, Mostafa TERRAB, which in a private field subject to a personal and closed authority.
This sudden attack raises more than one question, not only by its content, but especially because it comes from a media maintaining advertising relations visible with the OCP, and deemed close to decision -making circles. The context and the timing of this publication thus lend to reflection.
Appointed at the head of the OCP group in 2006, Mostafa TERRAB is considered one of the senior state executives and a major craftsman of the industrial renaissance of Moroccan phosphate. Since taking office, he has led to a deep modernization of the group, supervising structural transformations that have made OCP a world player in the fertilizer market.
Group revenues have increased considerably, in particular with the soaring phosphate prices, from less than 40 dollars per tonne to more than $ 300, thus significantly contributing to the country’s currency revenues and the financing of strategic projects.
However, according to Le360, this financial and technical success was accompanied by an excessive refocusing of decision -making power in the hands of a single man, in a context of the absence of institutional balance or effective administrative control.
The report underlines that the headquarters of the OCP in Casablanca, formerly the beating heart of the company, has become almost deserted from the Pandemic of Cavid-19, with a management now operated at a distance, mainly from the Terbo residence in Marrakech.
The report also points to what it describes as “capital opening” of the OCP Nutricrops subsidiary in the private sector, an initiative that has aroused controversy in economic circles, especially since it was not accompanied by clear communication or transparency with regard to public opinion.
-Even more surprising, the appointment of the controversial journalist Ali Amar – having already been the subject of judicial convictions – to manage the communication strategy around this file. A decision perceived as a triumph of the personal network on competence and transparency.
LE360 also returns to the use of the company’s resources to promote the personal image of TERRAB through social and communication initiatives such as ACT4COMMUNITY, interpreted not as an extension of public policies, but rather as a tool for building a personality cult.
Therefore, a central question is essential: why now? What are the real motivations behind this sudden attack targeting a figure hitherto perceived as emblematic of administrative success in Morocco? Is it an internal settling of accounts, or a change of course in the way the State intends to manage its strategic institutions? And how can a media like Le360, beneficiary of advertising campaigns financed by the OCP, operate such a turnaround, if it is only a professional criticism without ulterior motives?
What is certain is that the debate on the role of Mostafa TERRAB within the OCP and on the governance of the institution is now open. But it is just as certain that this debate cannot be reduced to one person or at one moment. Because here it is a question of the first national wealth, a strategic pillar of the country, which cannot be hostage either of an unconditional praise or a free lynching.
Despite the numerous questions raised by the Le360 report, especially on his motivations and his timing, it should be recognized that this media, whatever his reasons, remains on the professional, ethical and political discipline levels, much more rigorous than other platforms like the Desk, led by Ali Amar. The latter has made a specialty to attack respected sovereign figures, in a logic often perceived as revengeful and devoid of state sense.
The paradox is that Ali Amar is today a communications advisor to Mostafa Terrab, and that his media benefits from direct financial support from the OCP, which does not fail to raise legitimate questions about the nature of this relationship and on his influence in the campaign of unprecedented criticism targeting the current CEO of the Phosphartier group.
