More than 3,000 mayors, local leaders, ministers, and experts are meeting in Tangier this week. They are attending the 8th United Cities and Local Governments summit. This event lasts until June 25 at the Palace of Arts and Culture. The main topics are public services, city money, climate change, and technology.
Morocco’s King Mohammed VI sent a message to the meeting. The Minister of the Interior, Abdelouafi Laftit, read it out loud. The King explained that local governments are now much more important than before. “Territorial governance is no longer just a matter of an administrative nature or organisational logic,” the King said.
He believes cities and regions must help lower inequality and make people trust the government more. “A State does not owe its modernity solely to the solidity of its central institutions, but also to its capacity to provide its territorial domains with the power of initiative and participation,” the King added.
The King also spoke about the importance of daily services. “We consider that access to basic services is a citizen’s right and not a privilege linked to their place of residence or social status.”
The mayor of Tangier, Mounir Limouri, welcomed all the visitors. He explained that Tangier has always been a special place where different cultures meet. “This ancient metropolis has constituted, throughout the eras, a meeting space between civilisations and cultures, a communication bridge between continents and peoples, and a symbol of openness, coexistence and exchange,” the mayor said.
The mayor noted that people now expect much more from their local leaders. “The challenge is no longer limited to providing basic services, but it is now dependent on our collective capacity to provide services of higher quality, more efficient, more equitable and more sustainable, capable of keeping pace with accelerated transformations and responding to the aspirations of citizens.”
He also said that good public services show how well a city is run. “Local public services constitute the most direct expression of the quality of territorial governance, and the area where the relationship of trust between the citizen and institutions takes shape.”
Many important leaders are at the meeting, including the Prime Minister of Morocco, Aziz Akhannouch. The leader of the summit is Lee Jang-Woo, who is the mayor of Daejeon in South Korea.
Leaders are sharing ideas and showing what their cities can do. Guangzhou is showing its electric public transport system. Sejong is sharing how it uses artificial intelligence to run a bus system. Tangier is presenting its special water plan for the year 2050 to fight climate problems.
At the end of the meeting, the leaders will sign the Tangier Declaration. This document will share ideas on how to make cities better across the world. After this meeting ends, another major city group called Metropolis will meet in Tangier on June 26.
