The Malagasy people mourn their queen of Salegy. Sunday, November 19, the singer from Nosy Be died at the age of 56, in the north of the island, on the road between Nosy Be and Diego. Seriously ill, she died during her medical evacuation which was to allow her to leave the Perfume Island prison to reach the Diego hospital center.
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She was an icon in a musical genre traditionally dominated by men. Ninie Donia owes her fame in particular to her words. She is the first to have sung committed texts for the cause of women. “ She was a committed feminist, who had the particularity of not demeaning men, but of elevating women. » explains his friend, Cerveau Kotoson, professor of art and culture at the University of Diego Suarez, who visited him five months ago.
“ For her, man is man, but that does not mean that women should be less considered, less valued and valorous. It has always been a question of women emancipating themselves and finding their own means of subsistence, of safeguarding their own heritage. She was also in this perspective of telling women that at a given moment, you have to know how to say no, we stop paying, know how to say stop (to men) », he adds about the one who was serving a 19-month sentence.
“Protect local communities”
In recent years, the artist had also used his notoriety to defend the most deprived by leading a final fight which took him straight to prison. She was convicted of endangering state security and disturbing public order after leading demonstrations to denounce land grabbing in the archipelago.
Support for citizens and farmers in the defense of their lands and natural resources, “ the artist Ninie Donia was imprisoned because she carried out various actions to protect local communities in Nosy Be against the grabbing of their land against rich Malagasy people and karana, that is to say economic operators of Indian-Pakistani origin. Ninie Donia got involved in the defense of the inhabitants, in the land conflict which opposed them to the sugar company Sirama », Explains Mamy Rakotondrainibe, president of the Tany Collective, for the defense of Malagasy lands.
In addition to the tributes that have flooded social networks since Sunday, many voices are also being raised to criticize the power in place, accused of having put her in prison because her positions disturbed the economic interests of some.
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