The Moroccan policeman who asks for asylum in Ceuta: « I am panic. If Spain returns me to Morocco, it will be the end for me » | Spain
« Quiet. You are already in Spain and your request for international protection will be processed, » recalls the words with which the commissioner of the Tarajal border post, between Ceuta and Morocco. On Monday of last week, the MC National Police, born in Alhucemas 38 years ago, left his garrita on the Moroccan side of the international passage and walked half a hundred meters to the position of the first Spanish agent. « No. There is no problem at the border. I want to ask for asylum in Spain, » he was right to say – « in a state of shock, » emphasizes his story – when the police chief went on duty. But he kept shaking until the commissioner reassured him with good words. He was then accompanied to the Tarajal units where he remains – « guarded, not stopped, » he says – since then and where he talks by phone with the country after identifying himself by a video call, and having been interviewed by the local newspaper The lighthouse of Ceuta.
« I am panic. If Spain returns me to Morocco, it will be the end for me, » says this National Security Agent of Rifeño Origin (northern Morocco, former Spanish protectorate), which has exercised functions for 15 years in positions such as the Melilla border or the Government of Tangier. Periodically, he also served to the Tarajal border. « Six months ago I made the decision to ask for asylum in Spain, » he explains, « it became clear that the Moroccan authorities were never going to give me authorization to request the legal entrance visa in Europe, despite the fact that consulates usually grant it to officials. » The last day was the chosen date. He did not communicate his decision or family or friends.
The agent waiting for asylum says that he attended university tourism studies and obtained a chef diploma before approving the entrance opposition to the Kenitra Police Academy (50 kilometers north of Rabat). « I would not have a problem to find work in Spain, » he says, « but the harassment and discrimination of police chiefs forced me to appear directly at the border: it was the only exit that left me. »
« I witnessed cases of discrimination of Rifeño citizens who do not speak Dariya (Moroccan Dialectal Arabic) who did not want to attend at the police station because they only expressed themselves in Amazig (Berber language), » he says, « and that is a form of racism. When I presented a complaint, they always told me the same thing: ‘Jódete’, ‘Do not get mess. » MC says that it does not militate in any political organization, nor participated in movements such as the Hirak of the Rif, which between 2016 and 2017 triggered a wave of social protests due to the lack of state investments in the north of the country and in defense of the Cultural Identity Amazig. « I am a sympathizer of the Hirak, I share its claims, » he acknowledges. Naser Zafzafi, leader of the Rif’s revolts, That they had their epicenter in Alhucemas, he celebrates a 20 -year prison sentence with three other Hirak leaders. Half a hundred Rifeños were sentenced in 2018 to sentences between the three and 15 years in prison.
« My life, my physical and mental security are serious if I return to Morocco.
It is not the first time that a member of the Moroccan security forces asks for asylum in Ceuta, the Moroccan Informative Digital Portal BLADI.net. In July 202, two months after Migratory crisis In which about 8,000 irregular migrants stormed the Spanish North African Autonomous City, several members of the Auxiliary Forces (militarized police) swimmed their coast to request international protection. In September 2024, another member of that same security body was arrested when he tried to arrive in Ceuta on an aquatic motorcycle with the same objective.
Usually, asylum requests in Ceuta are produced in Spanish territory, after arriving irregularly by sea or after having jumped the border fence. An international protection request on the same border, like those recorded at airports, It is not precedents in the passage of Tarajal. The European Commission proposed last month to include Morocco in the list of countries of « safe origin », that is, considered respectful of human rights and without internal armed conflicts. That implies that there are few arguments so that its citizens can request asylum at the borders of the EU states. Brussels thus seeks to « rationalize » the international protection procedures for what he considers a collapse of requests.
The order dictated on Friday by the National Court collected the content of the Resolution of the General Director of International Protection, Dictated on behalf of the Interior Minister, Fernando Grande-Marlaska, who denied the asylum to the Moroccan agent. He considered that the allegations presented are « incoherent, contradictory, unlikely, insufficient or that contradict sufficiently contrasted information about their country of origin. » For all these reasons, he judged his request « unfounded » for the fact of « house a founded fear of being persecuted or suffering serious damage. »
From a border office of the Tarajal converted in its provisional accommodation, the Moroccan police MC refers that it charges about 6,500 Dirhams (620 euros), a monthly salary that allows it to stay as a single person and without children in a country where the minimum salary is around 300 euros. In his appeal before the National Court he alleges that his Rifeño origin and his complaints before his superiors for cases of payment of Scratches (bribes) that other agents demanded on the border of Melilla They carried a situation of professional discrimination, which prevented him from promoting police category and led to successive sanctions.
“The worst was when other policemen warned me that border mafias They were going to end with me, and that it was better to silence me, since my complaints were not going to serve anything, « there is revealed. » There are many agents who think like me; Some have already left to Europe with a visa to start another life. Somehow, with my decision to ask for asylum in Spain, I am sacrificing myself with a situation of great stress. ”
« My asylum petition has been rejected by the Spanish government, but I am still clinging to hope, » he states after the National Court of the National Court admitted a « precautionary measure « that stopped its return until the resource is resolved. « I have suffered injustices, oppression and psychological torture that have left a deep mark. I hope that my voice is heard, that my case is treated with justice. I am fully aware that I will suffer reprisals if I am returned to Morocco, » he declares in a trembling voice, while imploring that his situation is made known. « At night I waked up scared when listening to the slightest sound. So I think they will deport me or come to hurt me, » he rivets. « My fear grows day by day. »
