Morocco's King Names Fatima Ezzahra El Mansouri the Country's First Woman Prime Minister

King Mohammed VI tapped the Marrakesh mayor to lead a government after her party won last week's elections, making her only the second woman to head a government in the Arab world.

King Mohammed VI named Fatima Ezzahra El Mansouri prime minister on Tuesday, tasking the 50-year-old mayor of Marrakesh with forming a government after her party won last week's parliamentary elections. It is the first time a woman has held the post in Morocco, and makes her only the second woman to lead a government in the Arab world, after Tunisia's Najla Bouden.

Her party, the Authenticity and Modernity Party (PAM), took 97 of the 395 seats in the 23 September vote — more than any rival, but well short of the 198 needed for a majority, so she must now negotiate a coalition. The election drew the lowest turnout in two decades.

A lawyer trained at Mohammed V University in Rabat and later in France and the United States, El Mansouri became the first woman to serve as mayor of Marrakesh in 2009, lost the office six years later and won it back in 2021. She spent the past five years as housing minister. After meeting the king at the Royal Palace in Rabat, she called the appointment a "historic moment" and "a source of pride for me and for all the women of the country."

Morocco is a constitutional monarchy in which the king retains broad powers over major policy, even as the premier runs the day-to-day government. El Mansouri inherits a restive economy — youth unemployment, rising living costs and persistent social disparities — along with the multibillion-dollar build-out for the 2030 World Cup that Morocco will co-host with Spain and Portugal. The vote came weeks after tens of thousands of young Moroccans rushed the Spanish enclave of Ceuta, a crisis that laid bare their frustration.

In the new parliament the National Rally of Independents took 66 seats, Istiqlal 65 and the Islamist Justice and Development Party 54, a rebound from just 13 in 2021. The PJD's leader, former prime minister Abdelilah Benkirane, ruled out joining a PAM-led coalition, calling the party "tainted by fraud" without offering details. El Mansouri has rarely spoken publicly about women's rights; asked at a press conference whether religious ceremonies would have to be adapted for a female head of government, she did not answer directly, praising the king instead as "the biggest advocate for women."

Sources: BBC | Anadolu Agency | Middle East Online