National unity or unilateral Prime minister? A State Council’s “political decision”

The State Council has been taking its time to produce a verdict concerning Prime Minister Mangalaza’s demand. Christine Razanamahasoa, the HAT Justice Minister, has, this time around, refrained from pressuring the so named institution. She actually did not have to since Andry Rajoelina has, in between, recovered the High authority of transition’s persidency, and swiftly appointed Prime minister. Colonel Camille Vital is the official substitute for Eugene Mangalaza, though the de facto authorities put their money, on the very day before, on the interim insured by Cécile Manorohanta, Home Affairs Minister.  

The State Council is, consequently, no more compelled to produce an express verdict within three days. The institution has, against all odds, refrained from producing any shadow of decision concerning Prime Minister Mangalaza’s dissmissal. Andry Rajoelina’s new Prime Minister has, therefore, stepped into action while overlooking this judicial detail. The HAT argument is far simpler: the appointment of a Prime minister is government’s act, so the State Council has no say at all.  

The on going debate is, however, lively evidence that everything is not as so simple in the real world. Did Andry Rajoelina have the right to alter the law, and complete this government’s act in total contradiction with what has been recognized as the transition’s fundamental law, namely the Maputo national unity and inclusive transitional charter as well as the Addis Ababa additional act? Will the State Council come up to restrict Andry Rajoelina’s absolute power to rule at will by simple orders? This governance method is locking the HAT in its unilateralism garden and increasingly confirming, for those who still had doubts about it, its regime’s authoritarian quality… as a matter of fact.   

The HCC does not appear as the providential superhero flying to settle the present institutional crisis. The Constitutional Court has just granted legality to the Finance Ministry’s law presented by the “Vital government”. It certainly had been given not enough time to assess the project in a correct way, so it only let them get away with it. This favorable decision from constitutional judges could be, as a matter of fact interpreted as “recognition” for the Rajoelina mobility’s unilateral government and the lately laid Prime Minister Camille Vital.  

The State Council might also follow the HCC’s path. This institution is likely to keep on its own logic, and rely on a decision stemming from a precedent. The HAT decree aiming at dismissing ambassadors has been suspended. The State Council has, therefore, the possibility to suspend the national unity Prime Minister Eugene Mangalaza’s dismissal and the appointment of the Rajoelina mobility’s Premier, the colonel Camille Vital. This reprieve would be welcome now that the International Contact Group is seeking to kick start dialogue between mobilities again, and revive the consensual and inclusive transition. The institutional crisis in Madagascar is losing and bogging itself down in a wide judicial maze.