Rayan Oram’s, a five-year-old boy who used to live in Morocco, died after falling in a dry well, opened the eyes of the Government and shed light on the ongoing issues that are going on in the Rif region.
Local people who were present there were watching rescuers working hard around a stretcher, carrying the little boy out of the well he had been stuck in for days, and then putting him in an ambulance that drove off to where we were in the hope that it would get life-saving care.
The rescue team tried their best in order to save him. He was present there for four nights and five days, and people were desperately praying for him and sending him food, water and oxygen. However, that well was so deep that they faced hurdles with providing him with all these necessities.
People were in shock not only in Morocco but also in the world. Pictures of the boy while smiling and delicate face went viral all around the globe. Even the people who never had a connection to Morocco joined us in distress.
Everyone on the globe was just hoping that some miracle would happen. It is difficult to understand why this particular tragedy happened and took so much attention.
It has been many days since the Rayan died, and many people in the country are demanding the next step for the Government to ensure better safety for our most helpless people.
It can feel opportunistic and exploitative to use the death of a child to start a political conversation, but, at the same time, how can we shy away from the issues his untimely death revealed about Morocco’s many shortcomings? After all, another boy died the same horrific way only days after, and it got little attention.
After the death of Rayan’s, the administration of Morocco is working hard in order to cover the wells in Morocco and started taking all the safety measures so that they could avoid this kind of incident in future; however, there is so much more in order to avoid such incidents.
As per the World Bank, the pandemic created more poverty in the country, despite direct cash allowances to alleviate it.
