MADAGASCAR: PROGRESS TOWARD AN AGREEMENT, AS

C O N F I D E N T I A L ANTANANARIVO 000336


E.O. 12958: DECL: 05/11/2014
TAGS: PGOV PREL MA UN AU
SUBJECT: MADAGASCAR: PROGRESS TOWARD AN AGREEMENT, AS
SENEGAL ENTERS THE FRAY

Classified By: AMBASSADOR NIELS MARQUARDT FOR REASONS 1.5 D AND E.


1. (C) Summary: President Wade of Senegal has entered the
fray in Madagascar, inviting the "four protagonists" -- TGV,
Ravalomanana, Ratsikaka, and Zafy -- to Dakar this week to
reach and sign a political agreement on the way forward to
elections. The reaction here, among both the Malagasy
themselves and international partners, is decidedly tepid, as
they prefer to let the UN/AU-led local process continue with
no need perceived either for Wade's direct engagement or for
moving the whole show out of Madagascar. This initiative
looks from here as if it will die on its own. Meanwhile, the
local mediation effort continues to show promise of resulting
in a signed agreement soon, which -- in its current draft
form -- would exclude the four protagonists from running in
the next election, and also bar any minister or higher figure
in the transition from running either. That agreement would
not return Madagascar immediately to "constitutional order,"
but it would create a consensual path forward to early
elections that would do so. End summary.


2. (C) The UN's Tiebile Drame returned to Tana from Addis
on May 2 and has worked round-the-clock since then in
separate meetings with the various political "families" and
actors -- TGV/HAT, R8/TIM, Ratsirake/Arema, Pierrot/Arema,
Zafy/CNR, the churches, civil society, the military and the
"elders" -- to keep the process moving forward. By Sunday he
had refined his draft agreement to lay out seven temporary
"institutions of the transition," including an executive,
legislature, two "reconciliation" bodies, a new high court,
and an independent electoral commission led by civil society.
It also lays out several key principles to guide the
transition, notably that no one who previously seved as head
of state could run in the next presidential election, nor
could any minister or higher figure in the transition who
will organize these elections. TGV has told Drame that he
will not run in any event, and his "foreign minister" said
the same thing to Ambassador Marquardt over the weekend. The
presidential mandate will be fixed at four years, renewable
once (currently it is five years, renewable twice). There
are also amnesty provisions for "political crimes," as well
as a complete "annulment" of all charges and convictions
against Ratsiraka.


3. (C) The International Contact Group for Madagascar
(ICG-M) has not met locally since its initial meeting took
place in Addis on April 30. The AU is supposed to be in
charge of the ICG-M, but AU Envoy Ablasse Ouedraogo went
directly from Addis to Ouagadougou and only returned to Tana
on May 10. The UN's Drame has kept Ouedraogo informed of his
activities, but did not let his absence deter him from moving
ahead. Interestingly, former OAU Secretary General Amara
Essy is also reportedly back in Madagascar at AU request, and
Francophonie Envoy Kodjo, a former Togolese Prime Minister,
is also in town. The newly-named SADC Special Envoy, former
Swazi Prime Minister Absalom Themba Dlamini, is also expected
to arrive imminently. It is likely that the ICG-M will meet
once all these players are assembled. This delay, it is
widely hoped, also will allow SADC to make progress toward
moderating its unrealistic position demanding the return of
Marc Ravalomanana as the means by which Madagascar would
achieve "constitutional order." However, a formal change of
the position of the SADC heads of state probably can only be
taken at the Summit level, so eyes here are on the
rescheduling of the Summit postponed from May 10.


4. (C) Meanwhile, President Wade of Senegal has entered the
fray, over the weekend confidentially inviting the four
protagonists to fly this week to Dakar for a "Dakar III"
conference that, he says, would culminate in their signature
of a political agreement ending the crisis. (Note: Wade was
a major actor in the 2001-2 Malagasy crisis, convening two
previous conferences -- Dakar I and Dakar II. Neither
conference was truly successful and some here suspect that
one motivation on his part may be to vindicate and burnish
Senegal's role as trouble-shooter. End Note.) His new
initiative is not publicly known (although nothing stays
secret here for very long),but it is already generating
considerable pushback and seems unlikely to come to fruition.
Zafy and Ratsiraka reportly have declined to go, and
Ravalomanana's position is unknown. TGV is in frequent phone
touch with Wade, as is R8's "Prime Minister" Manandafy.
Ambassador Marquardt and the Senegalese Ambassador visited
Manandafy over the weekend at his detention site at Mantasoa.
During that visit, Manadafy took a call from Wade, to whom
he also expressed doubt over the wisdom of going to Dakar
now. Drame of the UN sees the Dakar initiative as entirely
unnecessary, as talks are going well already and the trip to
Dakar might just create new problems about participation that
currently are a non-issue. The EU ambassador here also sees
the Senegalese initiative as unnecessary and reports that
Wade is asking for logistical support from the EU and France
in order to pull it off. The French reportedly are not
enthusiastic either.


5. (C) Comment: We share the concerns outlined above.
However, we are not predicting any immediate breakthrough,
particularly as Ravalomanana's intransigent, maximalist
stance, fueled unhelpfully by SADC's position (and his own
imagination and arrogance),may not yet have shifted.
Indeed, he issued an outrageous press release on Friday
calling on the rest of the world to follow's SADC's lead.
Others' positions may also shift as a difficult consensus is
sought. All that said, we believe there is more promise and
less risk in continuing on the local track, and in leaving
the Dakar option in reserve, if indeed it is needed at all.

MARQUARDT