Rabat — Many view it as gainful employment for youths with too much free time.

Twelve years after conscription was scrapped, the royal palace announced in mid-August that compulsory military service is to be restored.

Millions of Moroccans aged 19 to 25, male and female, would have to serve for a year.

I'm "ready to join the army if needed," said 19-year-old Hassan, who works in a central Rabat restaurant. It's "normal to defend your country."

Fellow 19-year-old Kenza said that like many Moroccans she was "very surprised" by the palace's announcement. But "for delinquent youth, it's a good thing," she said.

The draft bill grants exemptions for students, the physically unfit and those who are raising children.

If passed by parliament in its present form, prison sentences of between one month and a year face those who refuse to answer the call of duty.

Morocco first brought in compulsory military service in 1966, a year after bloody riots.

An official report has pointed to a gulf in Moroccan society between the 15 to 34 age group and the rest of the population.

Unemployment, unfinished schooling, poverty, social isolation and frustration leave young people open to delinquency, extremism and migration, the report said.

Military service would improve their "integration into professional and social life" and boost their sense of citizenship, according to the kingdom's royal cabinet.

Mohammed, a 24-year-old photographer, buys into this message.

Military service "offers young people training that can help them achieve and integrate into the job market," he said, seated in a busy Rabat park.

The bill is to be debated in parliament this week and the first conscripts could be drafted by the end of 2018. — AFP