THE HIGHEST court in Madagascar yesterday backed the decision by its military, which successfully forced the president from office on Monday, to install opposition leader Andry Rajoelina as the country’s new leader.
Deposed Madagascar president Marc Ravalomanana had tried to hand control of the Indian Ocean island to senior generals rather than let his political rival Mr Rajoelina, who has been trying to topple him for three months, take over.
However, late on Tuesday evening in a ceremony broadcast from a military camp in the capital Antananarivo, vice-admiral Hyppolite Rarison Ramaroson said the military had rejected Mr Ravalomanana’s preferred transfer of power in favour of civilian rule.
Mr Rajoelina, who was the mayor of Antananarivo before he was sacked by Mr Ravalomanana early last month, claims to have the backing of 60 opposition parties who have mandated him to lead an interim government until new elections can be held.
Despite the 34-year-old former DJ being six years too young to hold the presidency under the constitution, Madagascar’s constitutional court yesterday backed his appointment in a public radio address.
In his first speech since he was swept to power by the waves of public demonstration against Mr Ravalomanana, Mr Rajoelina said yesterday that fighting poverty on the island, which is off Mozambique, would be his priority.
“I will do everything I can to ensure that Madagascans are lifted out of poverty,” Mr Rajoelina told around 15,000 supporters at a rally.
He said he would also sell Mr Ravalomanana’s recently purchased $60 million Boeing jet and use the money “to establish a hospital for the people’s health, which is a higher priority”.
Mr Rajoelina’s campaign to oust Mr Ravalomanana, whose whereabouts is still unknown, drew heavily on the local perception that the deposed president had enriched himself from state funds when 70 per cent of Madagascans live on less than one euro a day.
His dramatic victory, however, has been criticised across the African continent, with the African Union (AU) and Southern African Development Community (Sadc) questioning the legitimacy of the unconstitutional regime change.
Zambia yesterday called on both bodies to immediately suspend Madagascar from their membership because Mr Rajoelina was not democratically elected like his predecessor, who was two years into his second term in office.
More than 130 people have died in anti-government demonstrations since the end of last year. But it was last month’s killing of 25 protesters by the presidential guard that prompted the army to back the opposition, to mutiny and storm the presidential palace at the start of the week.