Malagasy President Andry Rajoelina acquired French nationality by naturalization in 2014. The decision was published in the Official newspaper on November 21 of the same year following the decree signed two days earlier by Prime Minister Manuel Valls and Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve – according to the documents we consulted. His wife Mialy Razakandisa and their three children benefited from the same procedure. The family was then living in France after Andry Rajoelina, president of the transition from 2009 to 2013, agreed to step back in order to turn the page on the coup d’etat which had brought him to power and allow the country to reconnect with the constitutional order.
Requested by The worldthe president’s chief of staff, Romy Voos Andrianarisoa, confirms that Andry Rajoelina “born of Malagasy father and mother, has been French since his great-grandfather and by affiliation and that he fully assumes both nationalities”. Responding from Geneva where the Malagasy leader takes part in the annual conference of the International Labor Organization (ILO), she wonders about the reasons for the disclosure of these documents: “No doubt this is a political maneuver. A significant percentage of Malagasy are dual nationals. We prefer to focus our efforts on development issues that are much more important to the population. »
This clarification, the importance of which is minimized by the authorities, nevertheless pierces a well-kept secret and a source of recurring debate in Malagasy political life. A fortiori, with the approach of the next election scheduled for November and in which Andry Rajoelina intends to run, even if he has not yet made the official announcement.
The president elected in 2018 has always maintained vagueness about his possible binational status, certainly considered unflattering for the image of the nationalist leader he intends to embody. A desire illustrated in particular through the request for restitution of the Scattered Islands, this string of lands located in the Mozambique Channel and which France chose to remove from Madagascar at the time of independence in 1960.
Andry Rajoelina still Malagasy?
Reading the Malagasy nationality code, however, raises another, more embarrassing question: is Mr. Rajoelina still Malagasy? According to article 42 inscribed in title III of the law devoted to “loss and forfeiture of nationality”, “loses Malagasy nationality, the adult Malagasy who voluntarily acquires a foreign nationality”. Category in which enters the president who was 40 years old at the time of his naturalization.
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