The 17th Mediterranean Festival of Amazigh Culture, called "Twiza", was inaugurated on Thursday evening in Tangier, Morocco, highlighting the need for an alternative cultural project.
The opening ceremony of this event, which will be held at the Ahmed Boukmakh Cultural Center until July 9, was marked by the inauguration of the book fair, the opening of an exhibition by artists Abdelkader Skaki and Mohamed Hasti, and a photographic exhibition of waterfowl and meadows by Boujemaa Lakrik.
The festival's director, Aziz Waroud, emphasized that the choice of this year's theme was based on the conviction that Morocco needs an alternative cultural project capable of accompanying the new development model in achieving its objectives, in order to achieve a true cultural and economic renaissance in Morocco.
In a statement to the press, Waroud said that this year's event follows HM King Mohammed VI's decision to establish the Amazigh New Year as an official national holiday, in line with the first Moharram of the Hegira year and New Year's Day in the Gregorian calendar.
He further noted that the program for this year's event includes intellectual meetings, artistic performances and exhibitions to highlight the richness of Amazigh (also known as Berber) culture as a component of Moroccan identity.
The first conference on this year's theme was attended by thinkers from Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, Syria and Egypt, who discussed the need for a cultural renaissance that breaks with traditionalism and paves the way for a modernity that accompanies the evolution of societies.
The seminar, moderated by the Moroccan thinker Ahmed Assid, was attended by the Syrian poet Adonis, Ibrahim Al Koumi (Libya), Raja Farhat (Tunisia), Amin Zaoui (Algeria) and Youssef Zaidan (Egypt).
The speakers agreed that the establishment of an alternative cultural project in the Arab world and North Africa requires first the disruption of social structures based on tribal, religious and ideological affiliations, and then the building of societies based on genuine democracy.
They also warned against the "dictatorship of democracy," which encourages the undermining of moral values in the name of "freedom", and the "tyranny of information", especially through social networks that sow discord and undermine democracy.