ANTANANARIVO, April 28 (Xinhua) -- A six-man delegation from the Southern African Development community (SADC) ended up its visit to the Indian Ocean island country on Tuesday after five-day consultations here with various parties.
The Madagascan transitional government said that the SADC, which left the country Tuesday afternoon, was satisfied with the efforts of the High Transitional Authority (HTA) to establish peace and democracy over the country.
A press release issued by the HTA said that the SADC delegation, led by John Kunene, a political analyst under Defense ministry of Swaziland, held closed-door consultations with HTA cabinet director, Zazah Ramandimbiarison and foreign minister Ny Hasina Andriamanjato.
At his meeting with the SADC delegation Tuesday morning, Ramandimbiarison presented a program for realization of peace and order in the country during the 19-month transitional period adopted at the national conference early this month.
Ramandimbiarison explained the HTA efforts and initiatives for recovery of the economy, which was badly hit during the social turmoil and political crisis, and for restoration of security over Madagascar.
The press release said that the SADC delegation was satisfied with the HTA efforts to seek consensus in the country, saying that SADC was willing to lend a helping hand to restore constitutional order in the island country.
As he told the transitional foreign minister Ny Hasina Andriamanjato last Saturday, Kunene reiterated that SADC had no intention to send armed troops to Madagascar, nor to help the outgoing president Marc Ravalomanana return home.
It took the media here by surprise that the SADC delegation, arrived here last Thursday, has not met the press during their 5-day stay in the country, though Kunene, the head of delegation, had promised to informed the media of the results of its visit.
Shortly after his meeting with the foreign minister Ny Hasina Andriamanjato last Saturday, Kunene said that the SADC delegation was here to assess the latest development in the country and to see what SADC could do to help the country get out of the political crisis that has been going on for over four months.
During their visit to Antananarivo, the SADC officials also met representatives of Ravalomanana's supporters led by Manandafy Rakotonirina, who was appointed as prime minister by Ravalomanana ten days earlier.
A local website said that Mananandafy asked again for return of constitutional order and restoration of the institutions, suspended by the transitional authority, before the establishment of a consensus government.
Manandafy, 71, also asked SADC to send military forces to Madagascar but a SADC senior official implicitly rejected the demand, saying that SADC was still in the process of listening to all stakeholders of the country.
This is the second SADC delegation which visited Madagascar just in one week.
A SADC mediation group visited Antananarivo a week earlier, during which they assured the Madagascan transitional authority that SADC had no plan to send troops to the island to restore former president Marc Ravalomanana, who was overthrew last month by the army-backed Antananarivo mayor Andry Rajoelina.
Denouncing the power transfer as unconstitutional, SADC suspended Madagascar's membership soon after Rajoelina was sworn in as president of the country on March 21.
The regional community seemed to soften its position on Rajoelina and his transitional government together with the African Union, which also suspended the membership of Madagascar.
The HTA said on Tuesday that its foreign minister Andriamanjato and the most senior military official Hyppolyte Ramaroson, to whom Ravalomanana handed over his presidency on March 17, were now in Addis Ababa for an AU meeting on Madagascar, scheduled on Thursday.
All representatives of international and regional organizations based in Madagascar and partners of the country had been invited for the contact group meeting, main tasks of which were to prepare for an earlier national election.
In other development, a press release issued by the foreign ministry on Tuesday said that Rajoelina had been invited to attend a United Nations Conference on the global financial crisis at the UN headquarters in New York early June.
