This study was published by the Kingdom’s Judicial Agency, which says that the “Covid-19” epidemic can be classified as a force majeure that allows the possibility of rescinding contracts and paying the absence of liability for non-implementation, or demanding a postponement of implementation and stopping the calculation of interests and fines.
The study indicated that legal obligations, regardless of their source, are valid and enforceable, so that every delay in this requires the debtor’s responsibility to pay compensation, interest and delay fines unless this is due to a foreign reason beyond his control known as “coffee force” or “sudden accident” “.
“the majeure force”
In this regard, Abdelali Al-Safi, a lawyer and legal expert, explained in an interview with “Sky News Arabia”, that the legislator of the Obligations and Contracts Law defined force majeure in Chapter 269 as “every thing that a person cannot expect, such as natural phenomena (floods and droughts). storms, locusts), enemy raids, and an act of authority, which would make it impossible to carry out the obligation.
With the exception of this text, the lawyer says, we conclude that force majeure is everything that a person cannot expect, provided that it makes the implementation of the obligation impossible, and the legislator enumerates some cases of force majeure, for example, but not limited to, among them the act of authority.
The legal expert continued, “Then, the Moroccan legislator, unlike the French legislator, who was satisfied with specifying the effects of force majeure, as he defined force majeure and gave it a general concept bound by two conditions; namely, the impossibility of a human being aware of this matter and then making this matter impossible to implement the obligation.
Al-Safi explained, that “Covid 19” is something that no one would have expected, and thus the first condition is met, and the discussion remains about the second condition.
The spokesman pointed out that Covid, which was declared by the World Health Organization as a pandemic, was also the subject of legislative intervention organized by Decree-Law No.
The decree authorized the government authority to take a set of measures that restricted freedoms, including the freedom to roam, shop and work in some cases.
And he added that in order to protect citizens and reduce the burdens of this assessment, Article VI of it stipulates that “the validity of all cases stipulated in the legislative and regulatory texts in force, during the period of the declared health emergency, shall be suspended, and its calculation shall be resumed from the day following the day the case was lifted. mentioned emergency.
The expert sees this legislative intervention as an act of the authority as well, and therefore force majeure within the meaning of Chapter 269 of the Moroccan Law of Obligations and Contracts, is available at the moment with all its pillars, conditions and effects as well.
correct description
On the other hand, the researcher says that when the Judicial Agency classified “Covid 19” as a force majeure that gives the possibility of rescinding contracts, paying to extend the deadlines and canceling fines, it gave a correct description.
He adds that the agency should not have argued with the emergency decree only, but should have framed the issue well by referring to Chapters 268 and 269 of the Law of Obligations and Contracts.
The study considered that the state’s responsibility for international obligations, whether before international bodies or organizations or before other countries, can be pushed to postpone based on the effects of the Corona epidemic, given the classification of Corona as an international pandemic by the World Health Organization, and therefore, for example Adhering to judicial precedents to pay the suspension of the payment of Morocco’s external debt. Before that, each case must be studied separately, whether from the legal aspect or from the economic and financial aspect.
The study stated that the Labor Code organized a set of cases in which it was possible to resort to the temporary suspension of the labor association, which would result in the suspension of the payment of wages and the suspension of the performance of workers. It also stipulated cases in which it was possible to resort to reducing working hours.
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