Rabat, Oct 24, 2011 (SPS) - Thousands of Moroccans demonstrated Sunday in cities across the country calling for a boycott of early parliamentary polls to be held next November 25, while others has been subjected to violence, Reuters reported.
In the capital Rabat, a Reuter’s reporter saw dozens of riot police with truncheons beating and kicking protesters who had gathered in front of the parliament building at the end of a march by around 3,000 people.
A local elected official in the country's biggest city, Casablanca, said about 8,000 people took part in a similar protest there. Several thousand took part in protests in other cities including Fes and Tangier, indicated the Agency.
Omar Radi, an activist from February 20 Movement's local committee in Rabat, said “these nationwide protests were held around the common theme of calling for a boycott of November 25 parliamentary polls.”
“It is obvious that the polls will bring to power the same figures who have for years been plundering the wealth of the country and holding hostage the future of the Moroccan population,” he added.
The protesters in Rabat and the other cities, joined for the first time this week by hundreds of jobless graduates, chanted “the elections are a charade, you will not fool us this time.” (SPS)
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