Background

Hundreds of people joined nationwide demonstrations between late September and mid-October, led by the Gen Z Madagascar youth movement. They protested against poor service delivery, including persistent water and power shortages, which they linked to corruption and poor governance. On 14 October, Michael Randrianirina, head of the Army Corp of Personnel and Administrative and Technical Services, a specialized unit, took power in a military coup, deposing then-president Andry Rajoelina and his government. Andry Rajoelina fled Madagascar and, on 17 October, Michael Randrianirina was sworn in as president to lead the country through a political transition process, which he said would take two years at most.

Economic and social rights

There were severe droughts linked to climate change. Meanwhile, the US government’s abrupt funding cuts to USAID impaired the work of humanitarian organizations, including UNICEF, the WHO and the World Food Programme. Consequently, the population’s access to food, water and health services was severely affected. In February around 8,000 children were admitted to specialist health centres with severe acute malnutrition in the Grand Sud region. More than 40% of the population lacked access to safe drinking water, with people in the Grand Sud particularly affected.

The government did not fulfil pledges to increase spending on essential services and provided little information on how the national budget was spent. Climate strategies lacked effective assessments to ascertain the needs of those displaced by drought-induced famines. Persistent nationwide power cuts led to increased insecurity and disrupted education services for more than 3,000 students at the École Supérieure Polytechnique Antananarivo, among others.

Freedom of expression and assembly

During the anti-government protests in the capital Antananarivo and other major cities (see above, Background), hundreds of Gen Z movement activists were joined by civil society groups, government employees and trades unions. Security forces used unnecessary and excessive force to disperse the peaceful protesters, including firing tear gas directly into crowds, using rubber bullets at close range and, in some cases, live ammunition against those not posing an imminent threat of death or serious injury. At least 22 people were killed, including bystanders and reportedly one child, while more than 100 others were injured.

Authorities continued to use Ordinance 60-082 of 13 August 1960 to criminalize unauthorized protests and arbitrarily arrest participants. In the Anosy region, at least 80 people remained subject to five-year suspended prison sentences for protesting against the operations of mining company QIT Madagascar Minerals. In April, activist Rodney Rehosy Fanampera received a three-year suspended prison sentence for leading peaceful demonstrations against the Base Toliara mining project. The same month, trade unionist Armand Frédéric Rakotoalison received a six-month suspended prison sentence for organizing a demonstration in the grounds of the Joseph Ravoahangy Andrianavalona University Hospital Centre.

In July and August, authorities harassed three journalists for covering “sensitive topics”. Government officials wrote to two media outlets requesting that they replace journalists Pauline Le Troquier and Gaëlle Borgia after the women suggested that the cause of some 32 deaths following a party might be botulism, challenging the official version that the cause might be intentional poisoning. During a press conference, journalist Tsilaviny Randriamanga asked about a Boeing 777 aircraft registered in Madagascar and found in Iran. Following this, the senate president issued a statement intimating that Tsilaviny Randriamanga was “in the pay” of government opponents.

Torture and other ill-treatment

In July the Ordinary Criminal Court in Anosy sentenced a man convicted of raping a girl, to surgical castration, a punishment allowed in child rape cases under the revised Penal Code. The practice violates the absolute prohibition of torture and other cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment. The authorities continued to promote the punishment as a populist solution to the alarming rise in child rape cases

Impunity

The alleged extrajudicial execution of Jean Salomon Andriamamonjy by security forces in October 2023 was not investigated. He died after suffering a head injury while held in a military camp after he had led a protest against QIT Madagascar Minerals.

The National Preventive Mechanism, an official body that was established to investigate cases of torture and extrajudicial killings, remained non-operational throughout the year. Security force members who used excessive and often lethal force to disperse protests, including the Gen Z protests in September and October, were not held accountable for their alleged crimes.

Right to truth, justice and reparation

The new government pledged to release those imprisoned for opposing the previous government. In practice the releases, which began in October, were not limited to unlawfully detained political prisoners but were extended to people held for recognizable criminal offences whose sentences had not yet expired.

Women’s and girls’ rights

Survivors of gender-based violence, particularly girls, did not receive adequate protection and support. No specific government budget was allocated to their care.

Parliament’s failure to advance a 2021 bill meant that abortion remained criminalized in all cases. Madagascar failed to ratify the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa, adopted by the AU in 2003. It contains provisions to protect reproductive rights by authorizing abortion in cases of sexual assault, rape or incest, where the continued pregnancy endangers the life or the mental and physical health of the pregnant woman, or in cases of fatal fetal impairment.

Discrimination

Children with albinism continued to face abductions and killings in acts driven by dangerous superstitious misconceptions about the condition. At least four children with albinism were known to have been abducted during the year. In March, the body of a four-year-old girl was found. Parts of her body, including her head, had been removed. No one was arrested for her killing.

In August the High Constitutional Court rejected a proposed bill that could have strengthened protections for persons with albinism, citing inconsistencies and vagueness in its provisions.