Maputo — The dialogue on the future of Madagascar between the four main political groupings on the island "will be the start of sustainable stability, lasting peace and will launch a secure platform for positive transformations", declared former Mozambican President Joaquim Chissano on Wednesday.
He was speaking at the start of a meeting in Maputo that brings together the democratically elected President of Madagascar, Marc Ravalomanana, the man who led the coup that overthrew him in January, Andry Rajoelina, and two former Presidents, Didier Ratsiraka and Albert Zafy.
Chissano heads the joint mediating team set up by the Southern African Development Community (SADC), the African Union, the United Nations and the International Francophone Organisation in an attempt to lead Madagascar back to constitutional rule.
"I have no reason to doubt the patriotism of any of you", Chissano told the four Madagascan leaders. "I feel that you all want the good of the Madagascan people, though you have different views about the path to follow".
He was sure that "with your patriotic spirit, and with our assistance, you will be able to bring your points of view closer together, in order to walk down the same road to the same objective".
Chissano said he had agreed to head the mediation team because he felt he had a duty to support "a member of the SADC family in its efforts to seek a definitive cure to its cyclical disease of instability and insecurity, of changes in power with little or no democratic transparency, with all the inherent damaging consequences for the welfare of the 20 million people who live in Madagascar".
He also accepted the job because he believed he could transmit to the Madagascans "the rich experiences of the Mozambican people in their struggle for freedom, peace and democracy".
Mozambique, he recalled, was once fragmented into ethnic groups led by rival chiefs, kings and emperors, who fought amongst themselves, and even enslaved each other, a situation made worse by the arrival of Portuguese colonialism. Only dialogue between Mozambicans "showed us that it was possible to turn our ethnic and linguistic mosaic into a force to transform our backwardness into development and our poverty into wealth".
"It wasn't easy", Chissano added. It took a ten year war of liberation before Mozambicans could sit at the negotiating table with the colonial power. That victory was followed by a destructive war launched against Mozambique by the white minority regimes of Ian Smith's Rhodesia and apartheid South Africa.
They had used Mozambicans as surrogates "in their desperate attempt to block the course of history and prevent the emancipation of the peoples of Zimbabwe, Namibia and South Africa".
The war of destabilisation cost Mozambique about a million dead, and the devastation of its economy. Passengers were burnt alive in buses, helpless civilians had their hands, lips and ears sliced off, pregnant women were ripped open.
"It seemed impossible that we could talk with the authors of such atrocities", recalled Chissano. "But reason told us that the only effective way of ending the people's suffering was patient dialogue, a dialogue which requires overcoming hatred and the spirit of revenge".
So first, Mozambique negotiated with the apartheid regime (a reference to the Nkomati non-aggression agreement of 1984), and then with "our Mozambican brothers (i.e. with the apartheid backed rebel movement, Renamo), rediscovering our membership of the great Mozambican family".
By "valuing what united us and removing what divided us", the negotiators "built confidence between us day after day", leading up to the peace agreement signed in Rome in October 1992.
The reconciliation which had seemed impossible, "spread throughout the country and became part of our culture", said Chissano.
"Today we continue to speak different languages, we have many different political parties, a variety of cultural expressions, but in all of this we find complementarities, which strengthen us and give us the sense of unity", he stressed. "Today we have a Mozambican identity. We are proud to be Mozambicans, united in diversity".
In constructive dialogue "nobody is defeated", Chissano declared. "Everybody is victorious. The people win".
He hoped that "this phase of the Madagascan dialogue, beginning in Mozambique, will be the start of an irreversible march towards stability, peace and harmony for the Madagascan nation".
Chissano urged the four parties to the dialogue to adopt an attitude of mutual respect, and to avoid inflammatory speeches or anything that might provoke violence.
None of the Madagascan leaders spoke - except for Ratsiraka, who merely asked everyone to stand up for the national anthem.
The meeting then went into closed session. The dialogue in Maputo is scheduled to continue until at least Monday.
Copyright © 2009 Agencia de Informacao de Mocambique. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com).
Mbola tsy nisy n'inona androany fa tsy maintsy nanome morale an'ireo bandy 4 dahy maditra ireto ny mpanelanelana.
Deba iany mba niteny hoe aleo aloha hitsangana isika rehetra hanao ny Ry Tanindrazanay malala ô!
Ho hita eo iany ny tohiny!
