In Morocco, scandal is weakening the kings shaky rule

FEW EVENTS have been a bigger indictment of King Muhammad VI’s rule than “Throne Day” on July 30th. The Moroccan king’s motorcade sped along an empty highway from his beach hideaway at Mdiq, in the north of the country, to a ceremony where members of the elite kissed his hand. Heading in the opposite direction, the poor flocked to Ceuta , the nearby Spanish enclave, as news spread on Social Media that the gates were open to Europe. By foot, road, rail and dinghy they came, until more than 70,000, most of them Moroccans oblivious to the annual oath of allegiance to their monarch, had risked their lives to flee Muhammad’s realm. About 100 died trying.