Gen Z protestors along Kenyatta Avenue in Nairobi on June 25.
These rebellions that Kenya’s Gen Z protesters started in 2024 have now claimed their biggest scalp yet, with the fall of Madagascar President Andry Rajoelina.
The irony is stark: Rajoelina, once a young DJ and mayor who seized power in 2009 through a youth-led military coup, has now been toppled by another generation’s uprising, and by the same army that once carried him to the palace.
Madagascar, the large red island off Africa’s southeast coast, is often seen as remote and beautiful. But three-quarters of its people live below the World Bank poverty line of $2.15 a day, and power cuts, dry taps and empty shelves are daily struggles. Those shortages, not opposition party banners, sparked the protests that grew into a national movement.
By late September, Antananarivo’s May 13 Square—the symbolic centre of a 1972 youth revolution—was once again filled with thousands of young protesters. Most were under 30, some still in school, others jobless or hustling to survive. Their slogans were fierce, their demands simple. “He [Rajoelina] must resign. Immediately,” said 21-year-old law student Angie Rakoto, quoted by Reuters. When pressed about who should replace the president, she shrugged: “Honestly, I've no idea ... but it must be someone for the Malagasy people, not himself.”
Tribeless
That shrug captured the movement’s essence. It was spontaneous, brave and pure, but directionless. The same “leaderless, tribeless, partyless” identity that made Kenya’s 2024 Gen Z uprising so fresh and unifying has exposed its limits in Madagascar. The young there, too, fought with spirit, but lacked a plan for what would follow.
The movement unfolded on mobile phones as much as it did on the streets. Banners and memes mocked Rajoelina’s speeches, while audio clips of him “confessing” to corruption spread swiftly across Malagasy TikTok before fact-checkers could respond. The protests were live-streamed, narrated by influencers and amplified by the Malagasy diaspora. It became a digital, decentralised regime change powered by hashtags rather than military orders.
Yet the army decided the outcome. The elite CAPSAT unit (in English: Army Personnel Administration Centre), which had once brought Rajoelina to power, switched sides and backed the protesters. Rajoelina read the signs correctly and fled.
This could well be Africa’s first Gen Z coup of the hyper-social media era—sparked and sustained online, then sealed by a military that chose to bend rather than break. It could also signal a new relationship between the barracks and the African street.
Across Africa, soldiers in uniform and protesters in trainers are increasingly part of the same generation. They grew up in the same hard streets, faced the same high prices, shared the same digital feeds, and lived under the same frustrated dreams.
Armies are no longer composed of rural recruits isolated from civic life. They are educated, urban-born and digitally fluent. Years of unpaid allowances, corruption and nepotism within the forces have eroded the myth of loyalty to political masters. By turning against discredited regimes, these soldiers preserve their own institutional honour.
Kenya saw a glimpse of this shift in 2024. When soldiers were deployed to contain the Gen Z protests, they did not zealously brutalise the public, choosing instead a stance of calm restraint. That moment marked a subtle yet profound shift in how African armies relate to the societies they once dominated.
Africa’s politics
Madagascar’s situation reveals both the danger and the promise of this convergence. The youth have proved they can shake power, but with no structure to replace what they have torn down, the most organised institution—the military—naturally steps into the vacuum. The young win the moment, but the system reabsorbs the victory.
Still, something irreversible is stirring beneath Africa’s politics. Youth protest is evolving from brief outbursts of rage into a more comprehensive form of digital citizenship.
These young Africans are not waiting for political parties or ageing elites to include them. They are building their own channels of influence through social media, crowdfunding, open data projects and civic tools.
Over the next decade, this energy is likely to coalesce into new political formations. Informal networks may evolve into civic movements with clear agendas on taxation, jobs, education and urban reform. Elected officials will face constant digital scrutiny from citizens who record every lie and broken promise.
If Madagascar was the spark, Kenya remains the testing ground. Its Gen Z activists have already shown an ability to combine humour with policy awareness. Their next evolution may be into local governance—running for county positions, forming digital cooperatives and turning their activism into tangible economic power.
Rajoelina’s fall is both a warning and a beginning. The continent’s rulers have been reminded that a meme can now undo power built on silence and suffering. However, for the youth, the lesson runs deeper: winning on the street is not the same as winning at the state level.
The author is a journalist, writer, and curator of the "Wall of Great Africans." X@cobbo3.
