SADC Wants ‘All-Inclusive’ Malagasy Indaba

Catherine Sasman

6 June 2011

THE Southern African Development Community (SADC) secretariat said it will meet with 11 political players, including ousted former President Marc Ravalomanana, in Madagascar to find a lasting solution in the country.

The meeting will take place at the secretariat head office in Gaborone, Botswana today and tomorrow to consider the SADC road map aimed at establishing constitutional normalcy after a coup d’etat that toppled former President Marc Ravalomanana and brought into power Andry Rajoelina who had suspended parliament amidst international condemnation.

SADC had appointed former Mozambican President Joaquin Chissano and his representative, former Minister of Foreign Affairs, Dr Leonardo Simao, as mediators to the crisis.

The road map designed as a political solution was criticised by the three main political movements, including the movement of Ravalomanana, as well as the National Coordination of Civil Society Organisations (CNOSC), and a number of international organisations.

Last Friday, more than 100 delegates from the three main political movements, church groups and civil society organisations, met at Antananarivo, capital of Madagascar, and resolved that a Malagasy solution is required to end the political crisis, and requested international support for it.

The resolutions of this meeting was communicated to SADC Heads of State of the Organ of the Troika.

The meeting stated that there is a need for a national dialogue amongst the political leaders of all parties and other organisations to establish a “climate of appeasement” and appropriate provisions to find a solution.

It stated that such a process must be conducted under the auspices of CNOSC, and that the participants be determined by CNOSC.

The future dialogue, stated the meeting, should take into account prior negotiations and dialogues that led to the Maputo Agreement, additional acts of Addis Ababa, the road map now on the table for discussion at SADC level, that will lead to a comprehensive political agreement for a consensual and inclusive transition to constitutional democracy.

The groups said a government of national unity should be instituted in the interim while elections are organised according to international standards.

“They [an election] should not be rushed in order to avoid creating a new crisis,” said the meeting, adding that the composition of the independent electoral commission (CENI) be reviewed to be neural and impartial.

The groups further said that the armed forces, that were party to the illegal take over of government, should similarly maintain neutrality for the national dialogue to be successful.

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