Around 100,000 children are undocumented in Morocco

Nearly 100,000 children are in Morocco are without a birth certificate, which hinders their access to essential services, such as education and health. According to the Spanish news agency EFE, not having a birth certificate, a family record book, identity card - leaves these children behind.

The Moroccan government launched in April 2019 a new national campaign to register these children as well as a joint ministerial committee and regional commissions, but the covid-19 crisis and confinement paralyzed this operation.

According to official numbers compiled in December 2018 by the Minister of State for Human Rights, Mustafa Ramid said that 91,474 unregistered children had been identified.

The president of the Amane Foundation for the protection of children, Abdellah Soussi, estimated that these figures do not reflect the reality of this phenomenon and are higher than estimated.

The third of unregistered children come from the region of Rabat, Salé and Kénitra. «Wherever there is social vulnerability, there will be many unregistered children», Soussi said.

NGOs working in the field of child protection are asking for greater flexibility in administrative procedures to speed up the registration of children.

The Moroccan government launched a first campaign in 2017 which, in December 2018, succeeded in registering 53,418 children.