News Center – Amina Bouayach, President of the Moroccan National Human Rights Council, emphasized the need to establish organizations in Moroccan universities to regulate the relations between professors and students to prevent sexual harassment at universities.

Amine Bouayach made the opening speech of the meeting titled, “Combating Harassment at Universities- What is the Role of Universities” organized by the Moroccan National Human Rights Council in partnership with Mohammed I University located in the city of Oujda.

“Revise internal policies”

In her speech, Amina Bouayach called on Moroccan universities to revise their internal policies that "encourage hatred speeches, discrimination and gender-based violence and are incompatible with the objectives of peace and equality.”

"When some sexual harassment cases surfaced in Moroccan universities, the responses of the authorities to the cases were late. Universities should establish special departments to support the victims and take urgent measures to combat gender-based violence,” she said in her speech.

Amina Bouayach also called on the universities “to organize meetings for new entrants to universities on the basic rules that represent the code of ethics within universities, to support and accompany them, to launch raise-awareness campaigns for students.”

“Break the silence”

"A recent British research on gender-based violence, in which five thousand female students in 88 universities interviewed, reveals that 56 percent of female students are subjected to harassment and violence at least once in their lives," Amine Bouayach said that the Moroccan National Human Rights Council has launched an "annual campaign aimed at encouraging victims of abuse to report and "break the silence" in order to combat violence against women and impunity.