Arantxa Campos, the president of the Confederation of Businessmen of Ceuta, described this Thursday as “disappointing” that the President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, has not demanded a specific date from Morocco for the opening of commercial customs in Ceuta and Melilla. In a statement to EFE, Campos assured that “in view of Morocco’s diligence in completing the preparations, as the President of the Government says, it is disappointing that a specific date has not been demanded.”
The president of the Ceuta employers’ association has highlighted that commercial customs “continues to be another alternative for the development of the city’s economic activity and, for now, there are no businessmen who trust in this route.” Due to this circumstance, Campos has expressed that he would like to know “if they have addressed the manifest non-compliance with the traveler regime on the border with Ceuta, since it does not depend on any preparation, simply on complying with current legislation.”
The business leader refers in this way to the fact that Morocco does not allow the transit of any merchandise through the Ceuta customs of Tarajal, even though it is transferred at a private level by a citizen. Arantxa Campos has thus analyzed the meeting that the President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, had yesterday with the Moroccan head of Government, Aziz Ajanuch, where he informed him that “everything is ready” to open the commercial customs of Ceuta and Melilla, to which The response was that the Maghreb country will do so when the preparations on its part are completed.
The Spanish president recalled that in 2023 customs tests were successfully completed in those autonomous Spanish cities bordering Morocco and that “everything is ready” for regular circulation to begin. In the case of Ceuta it would be the first time that this infrastructure was in operation, unlike what happens in Melilla where it was closed in 2018.
The deception, also palpable in the Melilla employers’ association
As for the Melillan Confederation of Entrepreneurs (CEME-CEOE), Spain’s land borders with Morocco in Melilla and Ceuta. “The Spanish Government should be more demanding with Morocco and defend the interests of Ceuta and Melilla more,” the president of the CEME-CEOE, Enrique Alcoba, stated in statements to EFE.
In his opinion, Sánchez’s appearance yesterday in Rabat does not contribute anything new to what the Government has been stating since the commercial customs on the Melilla border stopped functioning in August 2018 due to a unilateral decision by Morocco. “More of the same, is what we have been hearing since August 2018, when commercial customs was closed unilaterally” by Morocco, lamented the president of the employers’ association.
Hence the “disappointment” of the CEME-CEOE after Sánchez’s visit to Morocco, in which he met with the head of the Government of that country, Aziz Ajanuch, and was received by King Mohamed VI. According to Alcoba, there has been “little or no progress” regarding Ceuta and Melilla on the “normalization of the traveler regime” and commercial customs after the first meeting that took place almost two years ago, in April 2022, when both countries began a “new stage in their relations.”
According to Alcoba, there has been “little or no progress” regarding Ceuta and Melilla on the “normalization of the traveler regime” and commercial customs after the first meeting that took place almost two years ago, in April 2022, when Spain and Morocco began a “new stage” in their relations.
It was agreed in 2022
The opening of commercial customs in Ceuta and Melilla is one of the points included in the roadmap signed by Rabat and Madrid in April 2022, when Sánchez visited Morocco and was received by Mohamed VI to seal the end of the bilateral crisis. This document specified that the reestablishment of transit would include “appropriate customs and people control devices at land and sea level,” and the Spanish Government explained that this implied the reopening of the borders with those cities, closed by covid-19, as well as the reopening of the Melilla customs office and the opening of a new one in Ceuta.
Before Sánchez’s trip to Morocco this Wednesday, the CEME-CEOE expressed its confidence that it would serve to reopen the commercial customs of Melilla and end “the funnel law” that, as the employers denounce, is being applied with respect to the regime. of travelers since the reopening of the land border in May 2022. Since then, only those going from Morocco to Melilla can cross the border with purchases and personal belongings, but not in the opposite direction, with the consequent damage to Melilla commerce, what the employers interpret as a commercial “closure” of the border along with the inoperability of customs.
