Ratsitatanina

Ratsitatanina, also known as Ratsitatane (c. 1790-1822), was a Malagasy nobleman. Initially influential at the Merina court in central Madagascar, he fell from grace due to his opposition to the King's British allies. He was exiled to Mauritius, where he escaped from prison, was captured and was executed. He was the son of minister Andriamambavola and was reputedly the nephew of King Radama I, although the latter belief was challenged by the historian Pier Larson, who identified the two as brothers-in-law instead. The first Prime Minister of Madagascar, Andriamihaja, is believed to have been Ratsitatanina's son.

Opposition to the British Ratsitatanina was a divisional chief in King Radama's army as well as a trusted advisor to the King. His fortunes changed from 1817 onwards when governor of Mauritius Robert Farquhar, in a bid to counter the slave traffic from Madagascar and to curb the influence of the French, signed a treaty of friendship with Radama. Farquhar's agent James Hastie became the King's confidant, a development that sidelined Ratsitatanina, who allegedly favoured the French. As a slave-trader, Ratsitatanina was also displeased about Britain's anti-slavery policy. When he chastened and threatened Hastie over a failed military expedition against the Sakalava people with whom Radama was at war, the King ordered Ratsitatanina's arrest. The British administrators had plans to further exile him to the island of Rodrigues. However, Ratsitatanina escaped and was later captured in the mountains behind the capital of Port Louis by a private militia of maroon-hunters led by Franco-Mauritian lawyer and politician Adrien d'Épinay. An unlikely plot to lead a revolt of slaves and apprentices and to massacre the White inhabitants of Port Louis was imputed to Ratsitatanina and was eagerly believed by the jittery citizens. According to his own testimony, his plan in escaping had been for a boat promised by an accomplice to take him and an entourage of Malagasy slaves and apprentices back to Madagascar. Mauritian dramatist Azize Asgarally wrote the play Ratsitatane (1983) in Mauritian Creole. Considered the first historical play of Mauritius, the piece challenges the traditional representation of Ratsitatanina as a savage who abducted a French woman, raped her and drove her to suicide, and instead portrays a shrewd politician who works to rid Madagascar of British influence.