Madagascar is situated in the southern part of the Indian Ocean. It is 400 km off the Mozambic Channel.

Also, Madagascar is the fourth biggest island in the world after Greenland, New Guinea, and Borneo. It is 1580 km long from North to South and 590 km wide from East to West. Madagascar is covered of a total area of 592 000 square kilometre. Antananarivo (for short Tana) is its capital.

HISTORY

The Malagasy people began to settle in the island in 500. The Portuguese man called Diego Dias arrived in Madagascar in 1500. In 1610, it was the time for the Merina (local tribe in Tana) to reign in Madagascar; the first king of the Merina was called Andrianampoinimerina who tried to unite the island. Notice that most of the Malagasy names are very long which meant to signify something or an event that happened in their lives.

The French arrived in Madagascar in 1895 and began to colonize the country in 1896 ending up into different demonstrations including the Nationalist demonstration which took place in March 29, 1947 killing lots of Malagasy citizens and also the famous insurrection of freedom in 1947.

Madagascar officially gained its independence from France in June 26, 1960. This date is commemorated as the National Day or the Independence Day.

2001-2002 presidential election crises have changed the nation’s political aura forcing the former president Didier Ratsiraka to seek for an asylum in Paris with his backers. Ravalomanana Marc is the current president and took power in May 6, 2002. He has been so ambitious trying to renew international relationships with many foreign countries. Since then, Madagascar is not anymore new to other big nations; thus, the famous movie called ‘Madagascar’ was then internationally come into light.

Another political crisis came to rise in mid January, 2009 between the president Marc Ravalomanana and the ousted mayor of Tana (Andry Rajoelina). The national demonstration against the brutal and dictatorship of the regime brought about humongous problems since people were asking to implement Democracy. The president resigned and gave the power to a Military Direction and the latter transferred it to Andry Rajoelina ending at installing him and on a swearing in widely ignored by the international communities. The new regime was only a transitional one on the way to go through the fourth republic.