Despite clarifications from the Khemisset urban agency, the controversy is growing around the construction of a two-story café in the middle of a roundabout in the commune of Sidi Allal Bahraoui.
On Facebook, the Khémisset Urban Agency wanted to “clarify the circumstances of the case and defend the legitimacy of the project.” It thus affirmed that the project is “authorized” and that the owner of the café has a specific certificate of ownership for the roundabout, registered in his name at the land registry. Enough to provoke a wave of indignation and strong reactions from Moroccan Internet users. According to them, this type of project should be located in places intended for this purpose and not in public sites intended for public use. “Whoever finds a roundabout, let him put it in his name,” jokes an activist on social networks, indicating that the situation looks like an open invitation for whoever finds a public site to take it over.
To read: Morocco: controversy surrounding the construction of a café in the middle of a roundabout
For Moroccan Internet users, the clarifications from the Khemisset urban agency are synonymous with an attempt to justify a flagrant violation of the law, because the construction of this café in the middle of a roundabout constitutes a violation of the provisions of Article 4 of Law No. 19.57 on the regime of real estate of local authorities, in particular the first paragraph. This stipulates that the public domain of local authorities includes all real estate intended for direct use by the public or for the management of a public service, such as roads and their dependencies not classified in the public domain of the State. In addition, the first paragraph of Article 4 of Law No. 19.57 specifies that roundabouts are part of the dependencies of roads and are intended for public use.
