Indecission 2013

After Nearly 5 years of procrastination the Malagasy may finally have themselves an election. On October 25th Gasy will go to the polls, or more accurately the polls will come to them, and have a chance to vote for one of 34 different candidates running for the big seat in Tana. Unlike the Super bowl binary that we have in the states, Gasy have opted for a true democratic approach; where 33 of the 34 candidates are from the high plateau, all candidates must pay 50,000,000Ar ($25,000) to run (the average wage of a Gasy farmer is 2,500Ar, therefore it would take him or her roughly 56 years of labor without food, clothing or drink to raise such a sum; apparently in all fairness this was deemed possible by the electoral court), and piles of other money, which has been spent on campaign wagons and posters that clearly display which box to select on the ballot; take that Diebold. Of the candidates there is one female, a representative of Madagascar’s Green Party, and one representative from the Islands coastal population, otherwise there’s little difference between the remaining candidates.

The election’s still a big deal though, after two years of rescheduling by Andry Rajoelina, it appears that it is actually going forth and we expect a result. Gasy opinion on the coast is indifferent. The consensus is that things were better before Rajoelina and they’ll be better without him otherwise it’s more of the same. Considering this is a primary election, in which candidates with 10% or more of the vote will advance to the main event in December, indifference is a bit hard to judge. Does this mean the Gasy don’t care about such a crapshoot as 34 candidates present or that the possible 9 that advance will go just unnoticed? The big issues here are: the cost and availability of food, roads or lack thereof, and access to education; but it’s a tough to see how any candidate is going to resolve those overnight. The typical nature of politics here is that every 7 years there’s a coup (2009, 2002, 1995) if this continues how can any candidate hope to gain support in just 2 years; judging by enthusiasm it’s definitely leaning toward another one. But also this lack of enthusiasm means that there’s little likelihood of violent revolt to the results of this election; Gasy want stability in any form and that’s good for the Peace Corps too because another coup would likely close3 the program for some time. The people running may not realize that, but those whom I work with certainly don’t want me to leave.

Salama

Nick