Thami El Glaoui
Thami El Glaoui was the Pasha of Marrakesh from 1912 to 1956. His family name was el Mezouari, from a title given an ancestor by Ismail Ibn Sharif in 1700, while El Glaoui refers to his chieftainship of the Glaoua tribe of the Berbers of southern Morocco, based at the Kasbah of Telouet in the High Atlas and at Marrakesh. El Glaoui became head of the Glaoua upon the death of his elder brother, Si el-Madani, and as an ally of the French protectorate in Morocco, conspired with them in the overthrow of Sultan Mohammed V.
On October 25 of 1955, El-Glaoui announced his acceptance of Mohammed V's restoration as well as Morocco's independence.
Early life and career
Thami was born in 1879 in the Imezouaren family, in the Ait Telouet tribe, a clan of the Southern Glaoua. His family was originally in a place called Tigemmi n'Imezouaren in the Fatwaka tribe, near the Tassaout river. His father was the qaid of Telouet, Mohammed ben Hammou, known as Tibibit, and his mother was Zouhra Oum El Khaïr, a black slave. When Si Mohammed died on 4 August 1886, his eldest son Si Mhamed took over his father's position and then died the same year. After the death of Si M'hammed, his brother Si Madani took power and put his brother T'hami as his khalifat.In the autumn of 1893, Sultan Moulay Hassan and his army were crossing the High Atlas mountains after a tax-gathering expedition when they were caught in a blizzard. They were rescued by Si Madani, and the grateful Sultan bestowed on Si Madani from Tafilalt to the Sous. In addition, he presented the Glaoua arsenal with a working 77-mm Krupp cannon, the only such weapon in Morocco outside the imperial army. The Glaoua army used this weapon to subdue rival warlords.
In 1902, Madani, T'hami and the Glaoua force joined the imperial army of Moulay Abdelaziz as it marched against the pretender Bou Hamara. The Sultan's forces were routed by the pretender. Madani became a scapegoat, and spent months of humiliation at court before being allowed to return home. He thereupon began to actively work to depose Moulay Abdelaziz. This was achieved in 1907 with the enthronement of Abdelhafid of Morocco, who rewarded the Glaoua by appointing Si Madani as his Grand Vizier, and T'hami as Pasha of Marrakesh.
French influence
The ruinous reigns of Moulay Abdelaziz and Moulay Hafid bankrupted Morocco and led to riots, which european colonial powers saw as an opportunity to facilitate the control of a previously autonomous region. Moulay Hafid accused Madani of keeping back tax money, and in 1911 stripped all Glaoua family members of their positions.In 1912, the Sultan was forced to sign the Treaty of Fez, which gave the French immense control over the Sultan, his pashas and qaids. Later that year, the pretender El Hiba entered Marrakesh with his army and demanded of the new Pasha, Driss Mennou, that he hand over all foreigners as hostages. These had sought refuge with the former Pasha, T'hami, who had tried previously but failed to get them out of the district. T'hami handed over the hostages, except for a sergeant whom he hid and supplied with a line of communication with the approaching French army. The French scattered El Hiba's warriors, and Driss Mennou ordered his men to overpower El Hiba's guards and liberate the hostages. These then went to T'hami's place to collect their belongings, and were found there by the French army in circumstances which suggested T'hami alone had saved them. T'hami was restored to his position as Pasha on the spot. Seeing that the French were now the only effective power, T'hami aligned himself with them.
Lord of the Atlas
Madani died in 1918. The French immediately repaid T'hami's support by appointing him the head of the family ahead of Madani's sons. Only Si Hammou, Madani's son-in-law, managed to remain in his position as qaid of the Glawa, based in Telouet. Not until Hammou died in 1934 did T'hami get full control of his legacy.From that time on, T'hami's wealth and influence grew. His position as Pasha enabled him to acquire great wealth by means which were often dubious, with interests in agriculture and mineral resources. His personal style and charm, as well as his prodigality with his wealth, made him many friends among the international fashionable set of the day. He visited the European capitals often, while his visitors at Marrakesh included Winston Churchill, Colette, Maurice Ravel, Charlie Chaplin.
File:استقبال التهامي الكلاوي بقصر الإليزيه.jpg|thumb|Thami el-Glawi at his reception at the Élysée Palace in Paris in 1921, photographed with Abdelqader Bin Ghabrit.The Pasha attended the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II as a private guest of Winston Churchill, the two had met during the latter's trips to Marrakech, often to paint. The Pasha's lavish gifts of a jeweled crown and an ornate dagger were refused as it was not customary for gifts to be received from individuals not representing a government.
According to his son Abdessadeq, one of the principal means by which he acquired great landholdings was that he was able to buy land at cheap prices during times of drought. During one such drought, he constructed an irrigated private golf course at Marrakesh at which Churchill often played. When the French protested about the waste of water, they were easily silenced by granting playing rights to the top officials.
T'hami had two wives: Lalla Zineb, mother of his sons Hassan and Abdessadeq and widow of his brother Si Madani; and Lalla Fadna, by whom he had a son, Mehdi, and a daughter, Khaddouj. Mehdi was killed fighting in the French forces at the Battle of Monte Cassino. T'hami also had a number of concubines, of whom he had children by three: Lalla Kamar, Lalla Nadida and Lalla Zoubida. The first two of these had originally entered T'hami's harem as musicians imported from Turkey.
Collaboration with the French
Opposition to the nationalists
As part of the resistance against the French occupation, a political party, the Istiqlal had started up with a nationalist policy. T'hami and his son Brahim were supporters of the French, but several of T'hami's other sons were nationalists. This could be risky; he had one of them imprisoned in a dungeon.T'hami had grown up and lived most of his life as a feudal warlord, and so had many of the other pashas and qaids. Their opposition to the nationalists was based on conservatism:
- The only line of communication between the people and the Sultan was by means of the pashas and qaids; this was the route by which tax money found its way to the Makhzen. No-one - certainly not the nationalists, who were mostly commoners - should breach this protocol. The pashas and qaids believed that this social order was to the benefit of their subjects as well as themselves. This was perhaps true to this extent: any pasha or qaid expressing a nationalist sympathy was likely to be stripped of his position by the French and replaced by either a puppet or even a French official to the detriment of their subjects.
- As well as challenging traditional political power, the nationalists were also held to be responsible for endangering the spiritual leadership. Traditional religious sensibilities amongst the pashas and qaids were outraged by media pictures of royal princesses in bathing suits at the beach or by the pool. The nationalists were held to blame for introducing the Sultan to such new-fangled anti-Islamic ideas.
Rupture with the sultan
Two incidents led up to the rupture of relations between T'hami and Sultan Mohammed V.- Mesfioua incident: On 18 November 1950 nationalists staged a demonstration at a tomb in the ruins of Aghmat. This was brutally suppressed by police acting on the orders of the local qaid of the Mesfioua tribe. The Sultan, on hearing of this, commanded the qaid to appear before him to explain himself. This order would normally have gone to the qaid's superior, T'hami, but he was in Paris and it went instead to his deputy, his son Brahim. Brahim, instead of obeying, decided to consult his father, but omitted to obtain a definite response. The end result was that the Sultan's order was not carried out, and the Sultan gained the impression that the Glaoui family had deliberately ignored it.
- Laghzaoui incident: the French had set up a Council of the Throne supposedly to advise the Sultan, but in reality to impose policy upon him. At a meeting of the Council on 6 December 1950, Mohammed Laghzaoui, a nationalist, was expelled by the person who effectively controlled the Council, the French Resident. The other nationalist members left with him, and were immediately received in private audience with the Sultan. This confirmed to T'hami that the nationalists and the Sultan were breaching established protocols of communication.
T'hami's audience took place on 23 December 1950. Prior to this, Moulay Larbi El Alaoui, a member of the Makhzen had reportedly primed the Sultan to expect trouble from T'hami. The Sultan let it be known that he expected the audience to conform to the traditional pledges of loyalty with no political content. T'hami, however, started off by blaming the Mesfioua and Laghzaoui incidents on the nationalists. When the Sultan calmly responded that he considered the nationalists to be loyal Moroccans, T'hami exploded into a diatribe to which the Sultan could only sit speechless, judging it was better not to provoke a man who clearly had lost control of his passions. After T'hami exhausted himself, the Sultan continued his silence so T'hami left the palace.
The Sultan then conferred with his Grand Vizier and Moulay Larbi and gave orders that T'hami was barred from appearing before him until further notice. After the Grand Vizier left to recall T'hami to receive this order, the next two qaids were admitted for their audience. As it happened these were Brahim and Mohammed, T'hami's sons, who were qaids in their own right. Brahim attempted to smooth things over by saying that T'hami had only spoken as a father might to his son. Suggesting that this was an acceptable way for a subject to speak to a king was in itself a breach of protocol which only made matters worse. When T'hami arrived back at the palace, the Grand Vizier told him that both he and his family were no longer welcome. T'hami then sent his assembled tribespeoples and subordinate qaids' home without waiting for the customary public demonstration of loyalty; this action was construed by the palace as open mutiny.