Fez Happenings

A busy day for HM King Mohammed VI

Today in Fez, HM King Mohammed VI, accompanied by his cousin Prince Moulay Ismail, laid the foundation stone of a regional disabled care center, which will be built by the Mohammed V Foundation for Solidarity for a sum of 15 million dirhams (1.9 million dollars).

The facility will provide people with mental and physical disabilities with medical care, and social and educational assistance.

The 5,100 s-q-m building is composed of four zones - medical and social, social and educational, training and reintegration, and sports. The center includes a consultation room, three physical therapy rooms, a psychometric room, two rooms for speech therapy, a nursery, three classrooms, a library, a gymnasium, an out-door swimming pool, and an open space.


HM The King also laid the foundation stone for a centre for post-prison care, worth 3.5 million Dirhams ($457,000).

The new facility is part of the programme of socio-professional integration of the prisoners, carried out by the Mohammed V Foundation for the Integration of Prisoners, in conjunction with public and private partners and civil society, with the support of international cooperation.

The centre will include a reception hall, a meeting room, a library, an IT room and four offices. The prisoners will benefit from vocational training in areas that are consistent with the region's economic environment, to ultimately join a company or carry out a micro-project.

The post-prison care centres are the culmination of several agreements, signed on May 30, 2006, under the chairmanship of HM the King.

A Hammam Project update.

Members of the project team brief the media

Also in Fez today, a press conference was held to update the media on the Hammamed project - whose aim is to raise awareness for the hammam as a common cultural heritage in the Mediterranean area and beyond.

The project has a number of partner organisations working together with a focus on Saffarin Hammam in Fez, Suq al-Ghazal in Constantine, Algeria, al-Tanbali and Bab al-Bahr in Cairo, al Samara in Gaza, the Ammuna in Damascus and Sengul hammam in Ankara.

The View from Fez attended and will post a full report in the coming days.