Madagascar is a beautiful island, ringed by golden beaches and palm trees, and with an interior that is resplendent in its variety, from grassy plateaus to volcanoes and opaque forests and natural reserves.
According to local legend, the island was first inhabited by the Vazimba, a race of white pygmies. These people, if they existed, were displaced by successive waves of Polynesian migrants from the Malayo-Indonesian archipelago, from as early as the sixth century AD. In the ninth century, Madagascar was a major trading power in the western Indian Ocean. Moreover, ancient ruins indicate an extensive Arab presence on the island around that time. Bantu tribes from mainland Africa later settled on the west coast. The first Europeans arrived in the mid-17th century. Several French settlements were established on the south-east coast but were destroyed within 30 years.
At the time, Madagascar supported several kingdoms along its coastline and, in the central highlands, the kingdom of the Merina, which was the dominant ethnic group. From their fortress city of Antananarivo, the 19th-century kings gradually conquered the coastal kingdoms and by 1830 most of the island was under unified Merina control. The success of the Merina was partly due to a well-worked strategy of playing off rival European colonists against each other: in particular, the British and the French.
However, the UK – with copious commitments elsewhere – was content by the end of the 19th century to leave the southern Indian Ocean to the French. Without a counter-balancing power, Madagascar was vulnerable to French takeover, which duly occurred in 1896 when the Merina kingdom was overthrown by a French military force.
In 1948, the Malagasy people sought to re-establish their independence through armed insurrection. They were unsuccessful, but the uprising paved the way for independence, which came in 1960. Philibert Tsirana’s PSD Party ruled with the support of France and the people of the coastal regions until 1972, when highland agitation against French influence prompted the Army Chief of Staff, Major-General Ramanantsoa, to assume executive power for the purpose of pursuing a more nationalistic policy. Three years later the military government resigned after selecting Lt-Commander Didier Ratsiraka as Head of State. A gradual civilianization of the government culminated in 1977 in elections to the National People’s Assembly, which were won by the sole legal party, Avant-garde de la Révolution Malgache (AREMA).
Recent years have been marred by political, economic and meteorological crises. Indeed, some may be deterred by the levels of poverty on this island and the enormous gap between rich and poor. Nevertheless, Madagascar dazzles with its rich wildlife, with a large majority of its species unique to the island, and found nowhere else on earth. Of the popular creature, the lemur, there are over 10 different species alone. The island is a mass of unusual and colorful flowers and other flora. In terms of biodiversity alone, Madagascar really is one of a kind.
Geography
Madagascar, the fourth-largest island in the world, lies in the Indian Ocean off the coast of Mozambique. It includes several much smaller islands. A central chain of high mountains, the Hauts Plateaux, occupies more than half of the main island and is responsible for the marked differences – ethnically, climatically and scenically – between the east and west coasts. The narrow strip of lowlands on the east coast, settled from the sixth century by Polynesian seafarers, is largely covered by dense rainforests, whereas the broader west-coast landscape, once covered by dry deciduous forests, is now mostly savannah. The east coast receives the monsoon and, on both coasts, the climate is wetter towards the north. The southern tip of the island is semi-desert, with great forests of cactus-like plants. The capital, Antananarivo, is high up in the Hauts Plateaux near the island’s center. Much of Madagascar’s flora and fauna is unique to the island. There are 3000 endemic species of butterfly; the many endemic species of lemurs fill the niches occupied elsewhere by animals as varied as racoons, monkeys, marmots, bushbabies and sloths. There is a similar diversity of reptiles, amphibians and birds (especially ducks), and also all levels of plant life.