Gen Z anger at ruling elites is erupting across the world

Morocco’s capital Rabat gleams with new roads, restored buildings, buzzing cafes and its immaculate Andalusian Gardens.

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Yet across the river, the gloss quickly comes off King Mohammed VI’s showpiece city.

The adjacent commuter town of Sale is full of rutted roads, dilapidated housing and crime. A hotbed for activists over the years, it erupted again last week as young protesters in the densely populated neighbourhood of Al-Amal smashed police cars, vandalised banks and set properties ablaze. They were met with a brutal crackdown by the authorities.

Their anger stems from widening inequalities in a country that is spending billions on hosting the World Cup and such things as Africa’s biggest ice hockey rink, and where the ruling class lives lavishly but youth unemployment sits at 60 per cent.

And it is a resentment that is echoing across the globe.

While Europeans and Americans are showing their frustration by choosing more extreme politics, Moroccans joined a surge in Gen Z demonstrations in Africa and Asia against ageing leaders, corruption, joblessness, income disparities and economies that have left people in their teens to late 20s behind.

Thousands have taken to the streets in countries including Madagascar, Indonesia, Kenya and Mongolia over the past year as dissatisfaction with the status quo has boiled over, mobilised on social media.

Flagrant displays of wealth — from presidents wearing luxury watches worth three years of a regular salary to the children of ministers posting glamour shots from Ibiza on Instagram — have fuelled the ire.