Hicham Gerando and the Fabrication of Lies: How Deception is Transformed into a Tool for Demonizing the Judiciary?
Once again, Hicham Gerando returns to wage his usual battle against the truth, aided by a cohort of voices within the country, attempting to promote a false narrative surrounding the case of the girl Malak. According to the misleading script he has crafted, the matter has been presented as the arbitrary detention of a girl within a correctional institution, in a desperate attempt to demonize the Moroccan judiciary and portray it as a repressive entity targeting children. However, the truth, as confirmed by the public prosecutor’s office, is as clear as day: the girl Malak is not in prison but placed in a child protection center after being exploited by her family in extortion activities.
What Gerando is either unaware of or intentionally ignores is that child protection centers are not prisons; rather, they are educational and social institutions under judicial oversight. They accommodate minors who have committed offenses or legal violations, in accordance with Articles 471 and 481 of the Criminal Procedure Code. These centers aim not to punish minors but to rehabilitate them and ensure their protection from any potential exploitation, while providing educational and training programs that enhance their chances of reintegration into society.
The misleading rhetoric adopted by Gerando is merely part of a systematic approach that seeks to undermine the credibility of national institutions, particularly the judiciary, through distorting and manipulating emotions. This tactic relies on presenting issues in a truncated manner, with a deliberate disregard for legal and factual data, aiming to create a state of public sympathy based on lies. However, the era when such deceptions could easily pass has long gone; the Moroccan public has become more aware of such campaigns, and judicial institutions are now more stringent in confronting these waves of systematic media disinformation.
What occurred in Malak’s case is a blatant example of child exploitation in questionable agendas, where certain entities attempt to depict the Moroccan judiciary as an enemy of children, while the reality is that what transpired was a legal procedure to protect the girl from the exploitation she faced. This is not the first time emotions have been manipulated at the expense of the truth, but it is certainly one of the most revealing and naïve attempts. The Moroccan judiciary, despite all the desperate attempts to tarnish its image, will continue to uphold rights and enforce the law, far removed from the cheap propaganda campaigns promoted by some voices seeking sensationalism, even at the cost of the truth.
