Tension between Morocco and Algeria has been exacerbated anew. This time it was more foolish than ever, because it came after senseless statements of the Algerian Foreign Minister, who told an audience of businessmen that “Morocco, its banks, its compagnies only launder drug money in Africa.” This is utterly outrageous and lacks credibility, but above all it stirred up passions. It should be noted, however, that even in Algeria, these statements were condemned.

Moroccan banks operate in 26 countries in Africa, either by means of a takeover or by a simple participation. In a span of seven years, the Moroccan private sector has invested $ 8 billion in Africa, not only in the West of the continent, but also in the East. On the other hand, Algeria has no real economic policy in Africa.

On September 2, 2012 the Algerian daily “Al Watan” sounded the alarm in an article entitled “How Algeria lost Africa”. Mourad GOUMIRI, an Algerian academic, explained that “our African strategy, being built on a distributive policy of a slice of the petrodollars, collapsed about the same time oil proceeds dwindled”.