Madagascar Troops Defy Government Martial Law! :-)

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This is great news, but it won't be big news here unless we make it so.

Just like the French general strikes and US states declaring sovereignty.

If people and people in the military or police see this they'll think about it based on their own jobs, which means we should share it and similar news so our boys make the right decisions when the time comes.

We're looking at something like this going down in the next few months, especially since the Obamaphilia is wearing off and they need to blow something up and scare us to get us to support him again.

Alex Jones predicted the 9/11 attacks a few months earlier based on all the warning signs, he's only made one other prediction which may have helped save Iran from being nuked (so far), though it's still possible.

Based on all the signs and propaganda he's making his third prediction of a false flag terror attack in 13 years of ranting against the New World Order and being unfortunately proven right again and again and again.

There's 22 films, thousands of hours of radio and much more proving this, so he left a nice paper trail. At this point we should focus on explaining what's happening like we know it and aren't just trying to prove it.

Anyway, please enjoy the possibilities and spread the word...

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Oh yeah, incidentally there's a great song on the new Guns'n'Roses album "Chinese Democracy" called "Madagascar" that seems to foreshadow this, don't let the media convince you not to listen to this incredible album.

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http://english.aljazeera.net/news/africa/2009/03/200938135546136393.html

http://www.boston.com/news/world/africa/articles/2009/03/09/mutiny_breaks_out_among_madagascar_troops/

http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=84&art_id=nw20090308183038513C434116

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http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7941238.stm

Madagascar mutineers 'move tanks'

Dissident troops in Madagascar say they have moved tanks into the capital amid a violent power struggle between the president and opposition leader.

President Marc Ravalomanana issued a radio appeal urging civilians to help defend the presidential palace.

The military police and some army units are working together - but are refusing to take orders from the government.

President Marc Ravalomanana has been in a power struggle for weeks with former Antananarivo mayor Andy Rajoelina.

Negotiations between the president and Mr Rajoelina planned for Thursday and Friday were called off.

The opposition leader is apparently attempting to establish a parallel government by naming an alternative cabinet.

Correspondents say that as the country sinks into political chaos it is not clear who has the upper hand, and exactly what role the mutinous soldiers intend to play.

'Secret location'

Col Noel Rakotonandrasa, a spokesman for the mutinous soldiers, said tanks had been deployed in Antananarivo, known locally as Tana, as a precaution to intercept any mercenaries hired by the government.

Opposition supporters have said they fear the president might bring in mercenaries to counter mutinous troops.

CRISIS TIMELINE

Riot police confronting opposition suporters (Feb 2009)

8 March: Section of the army joins opposition
9 March: Rajoelina takes refuge in French embassy
10 March: Defence minster ousted
11 March: Army chief of staff forced out
12 March: Military police chief joins dissidents

Q&A: Madagascar power struggle

"We moved tanks into Tana during the middle of the night. They're not on the streets but at a secret location," Col Rakotonandrasa said.

The Associated Press news agency quoted the colonel as saying the tanks had been moved "to barracks where they are needed".

Col Rakotonandrasa was quoted as denying rumours the dissident troops were planning to march on the palace.

At least 100 people have died during opposition protests that began in late January.

The US ambassador to Madagascar warned on Wednesday that the Indian Ocean island nation was on the verge of civil war.

Growing resentment

Mr Rajoelina is a 34-year-old former DJ and businessman who was sacked as mayor of the capital last month.

He went into hiding last week after the security forces tried to arrest him.

Col Andre Andriarijaona (2nd right), 11 March 2009
Col Andriarijaona (2nd right) has said he does not intend to seize power

Mr Rajoelina's current location is unclear. A French official said he had left the French embassy, where he had sought refuge earlier in the week.

On Thursday, military police leader Gen Pily Gilbain said his forces were backing the new head of the army, Col Andre Andriarijaona, who earlier in the week ousted his predecessor appointed by the president.

But state radio reported on Thursday that Adm Mamy Ranaivoniarivo, who resigned as defence minister two days earlier apparently under pressure from mutineers, was back in his post.

Under President Ravalomanana Madagascar's economy opened to foreign investment, particularly in the mining sector, BBC World Affairs correspondent Adam Mynott reports.

But he says little of this has tricked down to the 70% of Madagascar's 20 million population who live on incomes of less than $2 (£1.40) a day, and the opposition has tapped into growing resentment.

Meanwhile, foreign governments are advising people not to travel to Madagascar and the tourist industry, a vital source of revenue, is reeling. More than 95% of foreign bookings have been cancelled.

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http://www.marxist.com/madagascar-troops-defy-orders.htm

Madagascar: Troops defy orders to put down opposition protests

By Fred Weston
Thursday, 12 March 2009

On Sunday the depth of the crisis and the level of social discontent in Madagascar directly affected a group of soldiers of the Army Corps of Personnel and Administrative and Technical Services who had been ordered to move against protestors on the streets. The soldiers refused to obey orders to fire on the people and repress anti-government demonstrators. Following this, they then declared they would not obey government orders either.

As one rebel soldier stated, "We no longer take orders from our hierarchy, we are following our hearts. We were trained to protect property and citizens, not to fire at people. We are with the people."

The soldiers at the Camp Capsat military camp on the outskirts of the capital of Madagascar, Antananarivo, prepared their lines of defence as they were expecting an attack on the part of the presidential guard. The 600-strong troops apparently control large stocks of arms and ammunition.

These dramatic events remind us of Bertolt Brecht's poem, "General, Your Tank Is a Powerful Vehicle", which goes like this:

It smashes down forests and crushes a hundred men.
But it has one defect:
It needs a driver.

General, your bomber is powerful
It flies faster than a storm and carries more than an elephant.
But it has one defect:
It needs a mechanic.

General, man is very useful.
He can fly and he can kill.
But he has one defect:
He can think.

These soldiers in Madagascar are being forced to think by events. As they say, they were trained to defend the people, not to shoot on them. And now they face the wrath of the ruling class and its officer caste.

Talbot Antonin Alexis, Director General of Madagascan National police, has called for unity between the police, the armed forces and the gendarmerie in a desperate attempt to re-establish some order. The Minister of Defence, Mamy Ranaivoniarivo, made it clear on Monday that it would be taking "military measures within the army." However, the Minister did not specify what measures. That explains why the soldiers prepared their lines of defence.

The government has accused the rebel soldiers of organising a mutiny, something the soldiers deny. They stated that they were simply refusing to be used against protesting civilians. Colonel Noel Rakotonandrasana, a spokesperson of the rebel soldiers, reiterating this point, explained that, "We cannot accept the repression of the civilian population."
The Director General of Madagascan National police, has called for unity between the police, the armed forces and the gendarmerie in a desperate attempt to re-establish some order. Photo: Christina Corbett/IRIN.
The Director General of Madagascan National police, has called for unity between the police, the armed forces and the gendarmerie in a desperate attempt to re-establish some order. Photo: Christina Corbett/IRIN.

All this comes at a critical moment for Madagascar. These events have taken place in the context of a bitter power struggle between the oppositionist Rajoelina and the President Marc Ravalomanana. At the beginning of this year Andry Rajoelina, the opposition leader, started calling protests against the President, Marc Ravalomanana. The President has not taken too kindly to the protests of the opposition and ordered the security forces to find Rajoelina, who in the meantime has taken the precautionary measure of going into hiding.

What has provoked the recent soldier rebellion has been the increasing use of the army to clamp down on the rising tide of protest sweeping across the country. Since the beginning of this year about 100 people have been killed on the streets by the army. In February a protest rally was marching on the presidential palace but it was met with brutal repression and 28 people were killed.

Madagascar has a population of 20 million people, most of whom live in abysmal poverty. More than half the population survives on less than $1 a day. Like most African countries, Madagascar has been forced by the World Bank and the IMF to apply so-called structural adjustment programmes, involving opening up its markets to the more powerful industrialised countries and privatisation. In the last recession in 2001-02 at the same time as a serious political crisis affected the country, GDP fell by 12%. Last year inflation stood at over 9%, seriously affecting the already impoverished masses.

The 2001 presidential elections were heavily disputed but in April 2002, the High Constitutional Court declared Ravalomanana the winner, who then went on to win a second presidential election in 2006. Since then, however, the world economic crisis has added to the already difficult living conditions of the masses. Ravalomanana's so-called "free market reforms" are now being exposed for what they really are, an attack on ordinary working people on the island.

Rajoelina, "a charismatic young businessman", as he is described in the media, and quite a wealthy man, also owns his own television and radio stations. He was the mayor of the capital until recently, and used this position to attack the government. In doing this he has tapped into a mood of anger brewing among the poor masses. In this context the army ranks have also been affected. Apart from refusing to fire on the people, the soldiers have been complaining about pay and the fact that their superiors have been embezzling funds.

The unfortunate thing about all this is the lack of a genuine mass socialist alternative that could unite the workers, the poor and the rank and file soldiers against the ruling elite. In 1972 the Party for Proletarian Power (MFM) was set up as a left-wing opposition. Unfortunately, as has happened to many former "left" forces in the past, the party abandoned its left-wing credentials to espouse liberalism and changed its name to the Movement for the Progress of Madagascar, in the meantime losing all its parliamentary representatives.

In the political vacuum that exists in the country we have unfortunately a struggle between two businessmen. But the movement of the masses and the revolt within the ranks of the army shows quite clearly that the potential is there for something much bigger.

After the mutiny of the Border Guards in Bangladesh, this revolt of soldiers in Madagascar highlights the point that Marxists have always made: in acute social, economic and political crises, when the masses start to move, the soldiers, the "workers in uniform", sons of workers and peasants, can turn against their officers, refuse to be used against the masses, and can therefore be won over to revolution. The famous "armed bodies of men" cannot always be relied on by the ruling classes. What we have seen in Bangladesh and Madagascar are indications of how deep the crisis is becoming. It bodes well for the workers of the world, but it requires a conscious, revolutionary leadership for it to be transformed into a force for revolutionary change.

Postscript: Since this article was written a section of the army has taken over army Headquarters and forced the defence minister, Mamy Ranaivoniarivo to resign!

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If you only listen to one thing this week...

Well, that's silly.

Just download and listen to this soon, okay? :-)

http://www.cuttingthroughthematrix.net/radio/Rude_Awakening_Black_Krishna_CKLN_FM.html

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