In Madagascar on Monday, gendarmes opened fire on irate locals following a dubious kidnapping case, leaving 14 dead and 28 injured, local and medical officials reported AFP.
“The gendarmes (…) fired on the crowd,” said Jean Brunelle Razafintsiandraofa, MP for the eastern district of Ikongo, where the incident took place.
“Nine people died on the spot,” said Tango Oscar Toky, chief physician at the local hospital. And out of 33 injured people received in the morning, five died in hospital, he added.
Ikongo experienced gunfire at around 08:00 GMT. Since last week, an albino boy has vanished, and the police believe he was abducted. This has shocked the small village.
People with albinism frequently become the targets of violence on the vast island in the Indian Ocean. The United Nations reports that over a dozen kidnappings, assaults, and murders have occurred in the previous two years.
The gendarmes have detained four suspects. However, the locals are committed to enforcing justice on their own terms.
In the morning, they went to the gendarmerie barracks and demanded that the four suspects be handed over, according to Razafintsiandraofa.
According to a gendarmerie source, at least 500 people showed up, some with “white weapons” and “machetes.
“There were negotiations, the villagers insisted,” said the source. The gendarmes then decided to throw smoke bombs to disperse the crowd and fired a few shots in the air.
But the residents continued to try to force their way into the barracks. “We had no choice but to defend ourselves…” said the same source.
Civil society frequently singles out the Malagasy police for violations of human rights, which are infrequently brought to justice.
