I still remember the Emergence scenario I was expecting for North & West Africa back in 1994 when i started my career in Emerging markets as African & Arab Credit Specialist; I was foreseeing for just the next decade exactly what we were witnessing on “Latam” (latin American) economies at that time.
With the capillarity of neighboring Europe, the emergence of a dynamic and resourceful “Mercosur” (the south American common market organization) in the Maghreb was guaranteed with the Algerian giant as the stabilizing energy foothold and the traditionally Liberal Morocco as the Private Entrepreneurship “perpetuator” for the region, with its Business Institutions still sound, if not virtuous, since its Independence.
Although we need it for planning, experience taught me that long term forecast is issued just to be ignored by fate, at least for its precision: instead of that twin regional emergence on both sides of the Atlantic, Morocco had to seek his salute on his own, and turned to face at 80% towards the EU, just like every other country in the area.