In Madagascar, a cattle theft turns tragic

It is hard to imagine that a simple theft of zebus in a Malagasy village could cause such a massacre. And yet this is what took place on Friday July 29, 75 kilometers from the capital Antananarivo, in a hamlet of a dozen houses with thatched roofs. Balance sheet 32 ​​dead and three injured in intensive care. The President of Madagascar Andry Rajoelina published Sunday – three days after the tragedy – a message promising to find and punish the thugs. Army helicopters are deployed to help ground troops locate suspects. The criminals now hunted down by the Malagasy government would be a dozen.

Local cattle rustlers are known as Dahalo. This poor ethnic group from southern Madagascar traditionally practices cattle rustling. A custom intended to provide a dowry to the family of a future wife. It is also a kind of rite for young men who are supposed to enter adulthood.

But this initially marginal use has been transformed for half a century into a lucrative and sometimes bloodthirsty business. In 2012, a former presidential guard for ex-head of state Didier Ratsiraka was accused of stealing 3,000 head of cattle. He had formed an armed group of Kalashnikovs which sowed terror in the countryside. Cattle rustling in Madagascar continues to regularly provoke deadly clashes.

The price of a zebu can represent a year’s income for a Malagasy farmer, in a country ranked among the poorest in the world. The economic and security situation has been deteriorating for a long time in the former French colony. Corruption, ethnic rivalries, political crises and often bad governance prevent the country from taking off. Plagues to which are added cyclones and drought, the public authorities providing little response. Tourism has been very affected by the Covid epidemic, and now it is inflation – a distant consequence of the war in Ukraine – which is weighing on the Malagasy economy.