Ben M'Sick aims to become a prefecture without slums in 2014. This was announced by Mustapha Ameur, acting governor of this prefecture of districts. According to him, the operations of demolishing shacks and relocating inhabitants are going well as the statistics attest. Indeed, between the months of February 2013 and 2014, 595 shacks were demolished, i.e. 69%, and 466 serviced land plots were distributed to 936 families. However, nothing seems won in advance. The files of the victims of the census operations still constitute a burden and risk seriously delaying the realisation of this ambition. Indeed, many are those who have qualified the census operation as dubious, notably that of 2010, because it was not based on objective criteria and its conduct was riddled with shortcomings. Particularly, in its phase known as the validation of results by local authorities. Thus, several people found themselves excluded from the lists of beneficiaries even though they were born and raised in these slums. At their head, the young, notably the married ones and those who have children. A population that is not only excluded from the right of access to housing but is also forbidden from benefiting from certain administrative documents. Indeed, since 2010, these young people no longer have the right to a certificate of residence nor to other identity documents. Thus, many are those who have neither a national identity card nor a passport. Worse, some even married without an act and had children without being able to register them in the civil registry. Serious accusations of corruption, favouritism and clientelism have been levelled against the mokaddems and caids accused of manipulating the lists of beneficiaries. "Accusations of corruption of local authorities are recurrent. Not a day goes by without us receiving complaints in this sense," the acting governor indicated to us during a press conference held last Friday at the prefecture headquarters, before continuing: "Often, these accusations are unfounded and made by protest professionals who seek to disrupt this operation. Until now, we have avoided legally pursuing these people because we did not want to create other hotbeds of tension." He even went further. He denies any responsibility of local authorities in the census operation. According to him, the relocation project is initially intended for families registered before 2010 and not for young single people. As for the choice criteria, they were set by the government. The same goes for the decision to forbid certain residents from benefiting from administrative documents. It is, according to him, a decision taken at the central level and which concerns the entire national territory. "There is a programme that has been put in place according to criteria and we are only simple executors of government policy," he specified to us before adding: "However, we have started a dialogue with these alleged victims and we have set up a commission in charge of examining their complaints. Out of 256 files, we accepted 51." And for the remaining 205 families, they have nothing left to do but cry as they no longer have any recourse and must take their pain patiently, waiting no doubt for the bulldozers to demolish their shacks over their heads. A position that reflects a change in perspective in the way the State treats the slum file. Public authorities feel today in a position of strength and negotiate from this posture. For local authorities, the "Cities without slums" programme must succeed at all costs and it is not a few families who want to have more advantages who will block this operation. Indeed, and less than a year from the deadline of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), the State wants to appear as a good student, even if it means committing irregularities. Public authorities thus aim to improve the living conditions of the poor by giving them access to water, sanitation, and permanent housing but while creating new pockets of poverty and other slums. A situation that has been recognised by the Ministry of Housing and Urban Policy itself, which intends to reframe the intervention of its department in Casablanca where the number of families registered in slums has been revised upwards.