Abdelilah Benkirane has embraced a handful of Mauritanian soil, 'land of his ancestors'

Mauritanian officials, who came to welcome Abdelilah Benkirane,were surprised when they saw him bend over to pick up a handful of earth and kiss Mauritania.

According to a Mauritanian media website that reported this, it is unprecedented, the prime minister explained his gesture, which shocked his followers and his hosts, that he is Mauritanian and  had returned to the land of his ancestors.

"I am from the Tajkunt tribe a branch of the Remadhéine,of Mauritania part of this earth" announced Abdelilah Benkirane to the attention of his host, the first Mauritanian Minister Dr. Mohamed Ould Moulaye Laghdaf.

The assistance was not out of surprises, as the Prime Minister of Mauritania listening  to the leader of the Moroccan government cite the names of the tribe and its branch, startled that he was also from this source , so that the two men discovered a kinship link between them.

Note that according to the same source, the plane of the head of government Abdelilah Benkirane had a breakdown at the time of takeoff, back to Morocco, which has forced Benkirane to return to rest at the home of his now-Mauritanian cousin the first minister Moulaye Ould Mohamed Laghdaf.