OPPOSITION LEADERS CALL FOR FREEZE ON PRESIDENT'S

C O N F I D E N T I A L ANTANANARIVO 000143 SENSITIVE SIPDIS STATE FOR AF/E - MBEYZEROV PARIS FOR RKANEDA LONDON FOR PLORD E.O. 12958: DECL: 11/04/2018 TAGS: PGOV EFIN MA SUBJECT: OPPOSITION LEADERS CALL FOR FREEZE ON PRESIDENT'S ASSETS Classified By: AMBASSADOR NIELS MARQUARDT FOR REASONS 1.4 B AND D. ¶1. (C) SUMMARY: Post recently received a petition from the "Madagascar Opposition Platform" to freeze all foreign assets of President Marc Ravalomanana. The Platform does not have any record of his actual holdings abroad, but based their petition instead on his alleged mismanagement of state finances and the special treatment granted to his company, Tiko. As the request lacks any legal standing, and does not provide any concrete details about the assets in question, it is not likely that any of the petition's recipients will take action. The diverse Platform is clearly having no trouble maintaining solidarity, but such tactics will do little to advance their cause. END SUMMARY. ¶2. (C) The Madagascar Opposition Platform, a loose organization of opposition parties that supports Andry Rajoelina, has issued a call to the international community to immediately freeze the foreign financial and real estate assets of President Ravalomanana. The brief, two-page petition outlines Ravalomanana's offenses as head of state and owner of Tiko, situates their request in the context of defending good governance, and was purportedly also sent to "banks, financial companies, international financial organizations, donors, the IMF, and the World Bank". ¶3. (C) The petition focuses on Ravalomanana's alleged misuse of public funds, favoritism for his company (Tiko), plundering of mineral resources and land, and embezzlement, which have allowed him to "illicitly acquire riches both in Madagascar and abroad, at the expense of the Malagasy people". The specific list of grievances is a familiar set, heard often throughout the crisis, including: - Tiko's failure to pay customs duties and taxes between 2005 and 2008; - financing of a flour mill at the Port of Toamasina, for use by Tiko; - theft of banknotes from the Central Bank of Manakara; - non-budgetary use of public finance to buy a new presidential jet. ¶4. (C) The Platform has provided the rough figure of USD 125 million as a working estimate of what Ravalomanana owes the state, and proposes this asset seizure as a means to recoup the loss. The petition makes no mention of what assets Ravalomanana may actually hold abroad, nor does it have any legal standing: these issues have not yet been considered by any court, Malagasy or international. ¶5. (C) COMMENT: The Platform has seized upon a defining issue of this conflict (Ravalomanana's perceived personal wealth), but with no proof of wrongdoing or evidence of illicit foreign holdings, their petition comes off as scarcely more calculated than their near-daily public speechifyiny on Place de 13 Mai. While many of the grievances listed in the petition are likely legitimate, the document is based on two rather sizable assumptions: one is that he actually owns ill-gotten foreign assets, and the other is that there is a legal case for freezing them. Neither of those is a given. Indeed, there is very little information here, even of an apocryphal nature, on what the President may actually own abroad. END COMMENT. MARQUARDT