Madagascar’s ruler Andry Rajoelina on Wednesday announced parliamentary elections for next March.
Three rival opposition groups held talks last week on forming a transitional government as a means of resolving the political crisis that has gripped the island in recent months.
But Rajoelina boycotted the talks and on Wednesday said he could not work with opposition parties to form a government of national unity, as international mediators had urged.
”Now it is the people who must decide. I have decided to organise parliamentary elections for March 20,” he said in a live televised address.
The new Parliament will choose a new prime minister, he said, and will also ”vote on the constitution and lead us towards a Fourth Republic”.
But the speech made no mention of presidential elections — the ultimate goal of international mediators.
Rajoelina, the former mayor of Antananarivo, seized power in March with the military’s backing after the ousting of President Marc Ravalomanana.
”Today we ask the international community not to become too involved in Madagascar’s problems. This country’s problems will only be solved through this [parliamentary] election,” Rajoelina said on Wednesday.
This appears to suggest the ruler of the impoverished Indian Ocean island, which has suffered numerous political crises since the 1970s, has turned his back on international mediation efforts.
Madagascan authorities have prevented the three opposition groupings returning to the island since last week, when they took part in talks in Mozambique, boycotted by Rajoelina.
The three movements had agreed on the sharing out of posts in a transitional government, and left some key portfolios for Rajoelina’s faction.
But Rajoelina reacted furiously to this arrangement and accused his rivals of ”high treason”, because they allegedly ”desire to remove Andry Rajoelina from the helm of the country”.
On Friday an international mediation group including representatives of the African Union, the European Union, France, the United Nations and the United States called on the conflicting parties to come up with a timetable for ”free, fair and credible” elections. — Sapa-AFP