An Island With Sapphire Fever
Madagascar's Hidden Wealth  by Rabenilaina Harinia Cyrille
 

Madagascar is a wonderful, tumbledown Indian Ocean island where people laugh at hardship. The laughter is quieter in the highlands than on the coast, especially in the north, where it seems as natural as the days and nights of equal length the trade winds that blow off the ocean. The people of northern Madagascar are aware of their land's individually. The tip of the island is remote yet privileged. The temperature averages a balmy 77°F, freshwater is plentiful and anything grows in the fertile soil. But the Tsaratanana mountain range, which cuts the north off from the rest of the country, can be crossed only during the dry season, and the population has mistrusted the central government and the long-dominant highland ethnic groups for ages. With the Indian Ocean on one side and the Mozambique channel on the other, the north is open to the world. The cosmopolitan population includes Afro-Malays, Arabs, Comorians, Creoles, Indians, Pakistanis and Chinese - a human brew that fosters a bemused skepticism. 

The harbor of Diego-Suarez, named after two Portuguese explorers who "discovered" Madagascar, is on the island's northeastern end. Shaped like a four-leaf clover, the 300 square-foot natural body of water is lined with beaches, mangroves and cliffs. It is considered one of the world's most beautiful harbors. Merchants, traffickers and buccaneers from around the world have found refuge in Diego. 

A century before the French Revolution, a ragtag handful of pirates lorded by a Provencal gentleman and a defrocked Italian monk - Mission and Caracole - founded a multi-national, multi-racial, egalitarian republic, out of reach of the world's powers. Libertarian, as they called it, had a constitution, a parliament and a freely elected president. The adventure quickly ran a ground, but the dream is still alive. An account in Daniel Depoe’s General History of the Most Famous Pirates is the odysseys only written trace. Mission and Caracole recognized that Diego was strategically located and easy to defend. They were also aware of Madagascar's potential wealth. The French came to the same conclusion when they showed up uninvited two centuries later. The colonizers cleared the land for export crops, prospected for minerals and fortified the natural harbor at Diego. Diego is primarily a port. The city itself, a chaotic outgrowth of the harbor, is in dire need of planning. Turn-of-the century postcards show an eclectic mix of beautiful Indian mansions and, already, jumbled, ramshackle shanties made of wood and two Foreign Legion regiments. There was a ball every night, beer flowed like water, CFA francs were plentiful and men in French uniform were everywhere.

Eventually, the contrast with the indigenous islanders' poverty reached the breaking point. In 1972, student riots toppled the pro-French Tsiranana regime. Three years later, young nationalists seized power, bent on ending neo-colonialism and turning Madagascar into a Socialist-leaning republic with a third-world outlook.

At first, the intelligentsia and most of the population backed the "revolution", but the country changed course at a critical moment. The oil crisis had rocked the world economy and prices of raw materials were plummeting on international markets. By the late 1980s, the huge foreign debt forced the government to adopt free-maket policies. It was in this context that the amazing news broke two years ago: south of Diego, that people were scooping up sapphires by the shovelful. 

In 1995, farmers on an illegal wood-cutting expedition in the Ankarana forest reported seeing fistfuls of blue stones. At first they thought the gems were worthless. Then the truth came out. The sapphire rush was on. Like many Madagascan names, Ambondromifehy is hard to pronounce (for the foreigners). The crowded village consists of several thousand traditional houses clustered on either side of the highway. For several miles the main street is nothing but a bazaar where everything is up for grabs. Ambondromifehy must be the best supplied outback market in Madagascar. Small tables and braided mats lying on the ground are cluttered with plates of blue pebbles, beam scales and calculators.

These stones, that is, the more valuable gems are traded openly in the street. People walk with their elbows raised, their forearms vertical, their hands at eye-level, pinching something small between the thumb and index finger. The stones are palmed around with everyone taking time to look. The bargaining is fierce, but from time to time, a deal is struck and a stone changes hands. It can change hands several times, for there is no lack of middlemen at the gem market. Gem merchants acquire them for clients in Diego or Nosy Be and major dealers come from Antananarivo or from other African countries. Prices depend on quality and need. At first, inexperienced merchants were selling three-gram stones for 10.000 francs a piece. Today they are worth over two million.

A huge vacant lot sits at the village's entrance. Here, dozens of shanty houses were burned down the night before. At Tombolaza, the village council president says, "We were lucky". "The fire broke out at one in the morning, when there was no wind. If it had started three hours later, half the village would be gone." Fire is not what really worries the leader of this community, which grew from 50 inhabitants two years ago to 15, 000 today. "It's like the wild West here", he says. "People do what they want, build where they want, dig anywhere. We gave permission to dig east of the road, not west, where the rice paddies find their source of freshwater and where Ankarana forest, a protected reserve, is located. Today almost everyone digs on the west side. People flock here from all over the island.
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That's natural because at home they don't have enough to live on, and the land is for all Malagasy people. But they should at least register and obey the rules. "Most prospectors take a trail from the village center, on the "wrong" side of the road. It leads to the oxbow lakes, sacred to the people of Ankarana, where they wash in the traditional manner. The trail rises through the forest, where most of the pits are in operation today.

At first, sapphires were found right on the ground; now they are buried at least 15 feet deep. We pass a line of prospectors on on the narrow trail. Bags tossed over their shoulders contain the ore, which they are on their way to wash. The next day the village is bubbling with excitement. The "authorities" accompanied by a few police with rifles slung over their shoulders, have arrived. Announcements are made over loudspeakers and leaflets handed out. From now on, everyone must register and possess an identity card. It is against the law to dig on the "wrong" side of the road, and to build less than 40 feet from it. Illegal houses will be torn down within two weeks. Here and there, a few groups discuss whether the measures should be taken seriously. Some tension is in the air, but most of the remarks are wisecracks. Everyone knows tomorrow the police will be gone.

Useful Addresses
Hotel de la Poste, PoBox 478, rue Joffre, E-mail : hoteldelaposte@simicro.mg
Hotel Le Colbert email : hlcdiego@dts.mg
Ramena nofy at Ramena Beach, tel. 261 20 82 223.64, Sixteen bungalows.

In the bay of Diego Suarez, considered to be one of the most beautiful and largest in the world. There is a legend around the bay about an utopian Libertalia Republic founded by two mysterious characters of piracy: the Frenchman Mission and the Roman parish priest Caraccioli.
 
 

About the Author

Rabenilaina Harinia Cyrille was born in Antananarivo. He and his family live at Cité des Professeurs, Fort-Duchesne, Antananarivo, Madagascar. He presently works as a teacher at College Saint-Michel teaching Information and Communications. He also works for the NGO Mianala as a project manager. He plays guitar in a band called VAIN, which plays a mix of grunge and folk. He will be contributing articles about life in Madagascar for future editions of Escape From America Magazine. He can be contacted at: niaa@refer.mg