Madagascar\u2019s former president Andry Rajoelina has been stripped of his nationality after fleeing the country earlier this month amid widespread youth-led protests.<\/p>\n
The news came as his former advisor, businessman Maminiaina Ravatomanga was arrested in Mauritius, on suspicion laundering more than $160 million using assets in the country.<\/p>\n
Ravatomanga, who fled to Mauritius after Rajoelina left Madagascar, was in the custody of the police and officials of the Financial Crimes Commission (FCC) in a private clinic where he had gone to seek treatment in Port Louis, a commission spokesperson said.<\/p>\n
The spokesperson, who did not wish to be named, said Ravatomanga’s arrest was related to the laundering of $163 million using assets in Mauritius.<\/p>\n
“The FCC has reasonable grounds to believe that … Ravatomanga, while being involved in the management of several entities in Mauritius, was in possession of property suspected to represent the proceeds of criminal activity,” the spokesperson said.<\/p>\n
Ravatomanga’s lawyer, Siddartha Hawaldar, confirmed he was under arrest in the clinic, but did not comment on the accusations against him.<\/p>\n
Rajoelina’s final weeks in office were marked by demonstrations that brought thousands on to the streets across the country, to protest power and water outages, the cost of living and corruption.<\/p>\n
When an elite military unit launched a coup, Rajoelina fled, claiming his life was in danger.<\/p>\n
On Friday, the country\u2019s new government declared it was stripping him of citizenship because he acquire French nationality in 2014 – in contravention of Madagascar law.<\/p>\n
Coup leader Michael Randrianirina was sworn into office on 17 October and has promised to hold elections within the next two years.<\/p>\n
Rajoelina\u2019s whereabouts are still unknown.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Madagascar\u2019s former president Andry Rajoelina has been stripped of his nationality after fleeing the country earlier this month amid widespread youth-led protests. The news came as his former advisor, businessman Maminiaina Ravatomanga was arrested in Mauritius, on suspicion laundering more than $160 million using assets in the country. Ravatomanga, who fled to Mauritius after Rajoelina […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9048,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":0,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":{"format":"standard","override":[{"template":"1","parallax":"1","fullscreen":"1","layout":"right-sidebar","sidebar":"default-sidebar","second_sidebar":"default-sidebar","sticky_sidebar":"1","share_position":"top","share_float_style":"share-monocrhome","show_featured":"1","show_post_meta":"1","show_post_author_image":"1","show_post_date":"1","post_date_format":"default","post_date_format_custom":"Y\/m\/d","show_post_reading_time":"0","post_reading_time_wpm":"300","post_calculate_word_method":"str_word_count","show_zoom_button":"0","zoom_button_out_step":"2","zoom_button_in_step":"3","show_post_tag":"1","show_comment_section":"1","number_popup_post":"1","show_post_related":"1","show_inline_post_related":"1"}],"image_override":[{"single_post_thumbnail_size":"crop-500","single_post_gallery_size":"crop-500"}],"trending_post_position":"meta","trending_post_label":"Trending","sponsored_post_label":"Sponsored by","disable_ad":"0","source_name":"Africa News","subtitle":""},"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":{"view_counter_number":"0","share_counter_number":"0","like_counter_number":"0","dislike_counter_number":"0"},"footnotes":""},"categories":[29,33],"tags":[1402,1086,4560],"class_list":["post-18356","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-east-africa","category-politics","tag-andry-rajoelina","tag-madagascar","tag-maminiaina-ravatomanga"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18356","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18356"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18356\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9048"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18356"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18356"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18356"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}