[FREE ACCESS] Explainer | The Intelligence Silence: Where Was Madagascar’s Spy Agency DGIDIE During the October 2025 Gen Z-Led Uprising?
Ujasusi Blog Originals | Intelligence Explainers
🎯 Executive Summary
On October 12-13, 2025, Madagascar President Andry Rajoelina fled the country following three weeks of Gen Z-led protests that culminated in the elite CAPSAT unit defecting to support demonstrators. Yet Madagascar’s primary intelligence service—the General Directorate of Information and Documentation Internal and External (DGIDIE)—was completely absent from all documentation of the crisis.
This intelligence explainer examines a critical yet under-studied phenomenon: the silence of intelligence services during regime collapse. DGIDIE’s absence reveals how intelligence institutions navigate the treacherous choice between regime protection and state preservation when the two diverge. Understanding this phenomenon sheds light on broader questions about intelligence ethics, institutional survival, and the operational doctrine that guides intelligence services during popular uprisings against authoritarian rule.
📚 Intelligence Theory: Understanding Institutional Silence During Political Transitions
Before analysing Madagascar’s specific case, understanding the theoretical framework of intelligence behaviour during regime crises is essential.
The Regime-State Loyalty Paradox
Intelligence services face a fundamental contradiction in authoritarian or hybrid political systems. Their official mandate typically includes:
Regime Protection Functions:
Monitoring domestic political opposition
Detecting coup plots and elite conspiracies
Surveilling dissidents and civil society activists
Providing early warning of threats to the current government
Conducting counterintelligence against regime opponents
State Security Functions:
Assessing strategic threats to national stability
Providing objective intelligence for policy decisions
Protecting constitutional order and institutions
Ensuring long-term intelligence capacity regardless of government
Maintaining professional standards and international liaison relationships
When a regime enjoys popular legitimacy, these mandates align. But during popular uprisings against governance failure, they diverge catastrophically. Intelligence services must choose: suppress protests to protect the regime, or maintain neutrality to serve the state’s long-term stability?
The Intelligence Neutrality Doctrine
Comparative analysis of intelligence services during the Arab Spring (2010-2012), colour revolutions in Eastern Europe (2000-2005), and African political transitions (2011-2025) reveals three distinct positioning strategies:
Strategy 1: Active Regime Defence - Intelligence services aggressively suppress protests through surveillance, infiltration, arrests of organisers, and coordination with security forces. Examples: Belarus (2020), Myanmar (2021), Syria (2011). These services typically face post-transition purges, international sanctions, and institutional collapse.
Strategy 2: Strategic Neutrality - Intelligence services withdraw from active protest suppression while continuing routine intelligence functions. Examples: Tunisia (2011), Egypt (2011-2013), Sudan (2019). These services often survive transitions with reforms rather than wholesale dismantling.
Strategy 3: Facilitated Transition - Intelligence services actively coordinate with military and civilian institutions to manage regime change. Examples: Zimbabwe (2017), Tunisia (2011). These services position themselves as guarantors of orderly transition.
The “Dog That Didn’t Bark” Intelligence Phenomenon
In Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes story “Silver Blaze,” the detective solves a mystery by noting that a guard dog didn’t bark when a horse was stolen—proving the thief was familiar to the dog. Intelligence analysis uses this principle: absence of expected activity reveals conscious choice rather than incompetence.
When intelligence services are absent during major political crises despite possessing the capability and mandate to act, three analytical frameworks explain their silence:
Framework 1: Intelligence Was Provided But Ignored - Services produced accurate assessments that political leadership dismissed or refused to act upon. The “intelligence failure” was in policy response, not intelligence production.
Framework 2: Institutional Self-Preservation - Services calculated that regime protection conflicted with long-term institutional survival, choosing neutrality to preserve capacity for post-transition government.
Framework 3: Professional Ethics Positioning - Services concluded that suppressing legitimate popular grievances violated professional standards, international norms, or officers’ personal values.
📊 The Madagascar Case: Timeline and Evidence
Understanding DGIDIE’s silence requires establishing what actually occurred during Madagascar’s October 2025 uprising.
Phase One: Popular Mobilisation (September 18-25)
Politicians Clémence Raharinirina and Baba Faniry Rakotoarisoa publicly called for mass protests on September 18, denouncing chronic power outages, water cuts, and systemic corruption. A Facebook page named Gen Z Madagascar emerged, gaining over 100,000 followers in five days using symbols from youth movements in Kenya, Nepal, Indonesia, and Morocco.
On September 25, protests erupted in six major cities. Security forces deployed from 5:30 AM, using tear gas, rubber bullets, and live ammunition. UN High Commissioner Volker Türk condemned security forces’ “unnecessary and disproportionate force.”
Phase Two: Regime Tactical Response (September 26 - October 8)
At least 22 people died in the first week. Rajoelina dismissed his energy minister on September 26, then dissolved the entire government on September 29. Protesters rejected these gestures. Protests intensified with demands for Rajoelina’s resignation. More than 200 NGOs called for an end to repression.
Phase Three: Military Defection (October 9-13)
After seventeen consecutive days of popular protest, CAPSAT forces made their choice. Soldiers posted videos stating: “We have become boot lickers...We have chosen to submit and execute orders, even illegal ones, instead of protecting the population.” Colonel Michael Randrianirina clarified CAPSAT had “answered the people’s calls.” Rajoelina evacuated via helicopter to a French military aircraft.
The Evidence of DGIDIE’s Absence
Across three weeks of crisis, DGIDIE appears in zero UN reports, diplomatic statements, protest documentation, security force accounts, or post-uprising analysis. Compare this to other security institutions:
Documented Actors:
Gendarmerie: Deployed from 5:30 AM on September 25, accused of killing a CAPSAT soldier
Police: Used tear gas and stun grenades throughout the crisis
CAPSAT: Broke ranks, installed General Demosthene Pikulas as army chief
Absent Actor:
DGIDIE: No documented surveillance, arrests, infiltration, intelligence reports, or operational activity
This is not reporting oversight. When intelligence services suppress protests—as in Belarus, Myanmar, or Zimbabwe under Mugabe—their presence is documented through arrests of organisers, social media monitoring, or surveillance operations.
🕵️ DGIDIE’s Capabilities: Why Silence Is Significant
DGIDIE’s absence is significant precisely because the organisation possesses demonstrated capability.
Organisational Structure
The General Directorate of Information and Documentation Internal and External (DGIDIE) serves as Madagascar’s central intelligence agency. Created during President Didier Ratsiraka’s socialist Second Republic, the organisation was trained by East German advisers and later by French security personnel.
DGIDIE’s Mandate:
Domestic intelligence collection and political surveillance
External intelligence gathering and analysis
Strategic threat assessment for national leadership
Counterintelligence operations
The organisation relies on vast informer networks to monitor dissidents, currency violators, and political opposition—a HUMINT collection model inherited from Cold War authoritarian intelligence architectures.
Demonstrated Operational Capability
In July 2021, DGIDIE-coordinated operations foiled an assassination plot against Rajoelina, arresting six people, including two French nationals. Authorities later arrested 21 individuals, including five generals, in expanded coup investigations.
This demonstrates:
Sophisticated HUMINT penetration of elite networks
Competent surveillance tradecraft
Effective operational security
Capacity to coordinate complex counterintelligence operations
The Analytical Paradox: An organisation capable of penetrating assassination conspiracies and coup plots was completely absent during three weeks of popular uprising monitored by international media, UN observers, and diplomatic missions.
💡 Explaining the Silence: Five Intelligence Frameworks
Framework 1: Strategic Intelligence Production vs. Tactical Policy Failure
DGIDIE may have provided accurate strategic assessments that Rajoelina dismissed. Professional intelligence services conducting strategic analysis in late 2024 and early 2025 would have identified:
70% of citizens believed Madagascar was going in the wrong direction
Only one-third have electricity access, with blackouts exceeding eight hours daily
Gen Z movements in Kenya, Nepal, and Morocco demonstrated the capacity to topple governments
CAPSAT’s 2009 role as kingmaker created vulnerability
Intelligence Theory Application: If DGIDIE provided these assessments and Rajoelina pursued tactical responses (dismissing ministers) instead of strategic reforms, the “intelligence failure” was in policy implementation rather than intelligence production. This explains why no evidence exists of DGIDIE surveilling Gen Z protesters—services recognised these as legitimate governance demands rather than subversive conspiracies.
Framework 2: Institutional Neutrality Doctrine
DGIDIE may have applied the strategic neutrality doctrine observed in Tunisia (2011) and Egypt (2011-2013). This doctrine holds that when:
Popular protests reflect governance failure rather than foreign manipulation
Regime’s violent suppression creates long-term instability
Intelligence service credibility requires distance from repression
Post-transition government will require functioning intelligence capacity
Then institutional survival requires withdrawing from protest suppression while maintaining routine intelligence functions.
CAPSAT’s statement—refusing “illegal orders” to protect “the population” rather than the regime—suggests broader institutional sentiment within Madagascar’s security establishment about the ethics of suppressing legitimate grievances.
Framework 3: Professional Ethics and International Norms
DGIDIE officers witnessing 22 deaths from security force violence and over 100 injuries may have concluded that actively suppressing peaceful protesters demanding healthcare, education, electricity, and anti-corruption measures would:
Violate international human rights norms
Constitute illegal surveillance of peaceful assembly
Damage Madagascar’s international intelligence relationships
Compromise individual officers’ professional ethics
Intelligence services in democratic or transitioning states increasingly reference international legal frameworks—including UN human rights conventions—as justification for refusing regime orders to suppress legitimate protest.
Framework 4: Institutional Survival Calculation
Intelligence services are institutional actors with survival interests transcending individual regimes. DGIDIE leadership may have calculated:
Short-term regime protection = long-term institutional damage
Historical precedent supports this calculation:
Tunisia (2011): Intelligence services maintained neutrality; survived post-Ben Ali transition with reforms
Egypt (2011): Military intelligence facilitated Mubarak’s departure; maintained institutional continuity
Sudan (2019): Intelligence elements recognised al-Bashir’s unsustainability; preserved capacity post-transition
Zimbabwe (2017): Intelligence coordinated Mugabe’s removal; strengthened institutional positioning
Conversely, active protest suppression produced:
Belarus (2020): Intelligence services face international sanctions, emigration of skilled officers
Myanmar (2021): Intelligence apparatus was damaged by international isolation
Syria (2011-present): Intelligence services synonymous with regime atrocities; compromised international relationships
DGIDIE’s silence suggests Madagascar’s intelligence leadership studied these precedents and chose institutional preservation over regime protection.
Framework 5: External Intelligence Patron Influence
French security advisers have repeatedly trained Madagascar’s intelligence forces. The French military facilitated Rajoelina’s evacuation with reported coordination involving French President Emmanuel Macron.
French intelligence—through training relationships and liaison channels—may have communicated:
France would not support violent suppression of legitimate protests
International opinion favoured protesters’ grievances
Rajoelina’s position was untenable
DGIDIE should maintain neutrality to preserve French cooperation post-transition
This reflects France’s strategic calculation across Francophone Africa: prioritising long-term stability over short-term authoritarian support when regimes face irreversible legitimacy erosion.
🌍 Comparative Intelligence Analysis: Patterns During Popular Uprisings
DGIDIE’s positioning reflects documented patterns:
Tunisia (2011): The Intelligence Neutrality Model
Tunisian intelligence services maintained operational distance from violent suppression of protests against President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali. Post-revolution, Tunisia’s intelligence apparatus survived with structural reforms rather than wholesale purging, maintaining international liaison relationships and domestic legitimacy.
Egypt (2011-2013): Military Intelligence Facilitation
Egyptian military intelligence assessed that Hosni Mubarak’s regime was unsustainable. Intelligence leadership facilitated his departure while preserving institutional continuity. The military’s intelligence apparatus remained intact through transitions, demonstrating how institutional identity separate from regime identity enables survival.
Sudan (2019): Intelligence Service Fracture
Sudanese intelligence services split during protests against Omar al-Bashir. Elements recognised the Sudanese Professionals Association’s organising capacity represented irreversible popular mobilisation. Those maintaining neutrality preserved post-transition roles; those actively suppressing protests faced purges.
Zimbabwe (2017): Coordinated Intelligence Transition
Zimbabwean military intelligence coordinated with civilian intelligence to facilitate Robert Mugabe’s removal when regime survival threatened institutional interests. Intelligence services positioned themselves as guarantors of orderly transition, strengthening institutional standing.
Common Pattern: Intelligence services maintaining institutional identity separate from regime identity can navigate popular uprisings by choosing state service over regime protection. Those becoming synonymous with regime repression face post-transition purges, international isolation, or institutional collapse.
📈 The Intelligence Dilemma: Regime vs. State Service
DGIDIE’s silence exposes fundamental tensions in intelligence services’ mandate during regime collapse:
When Protests Reflect Governance Failure, Not Subversion
Traditional intelligence doctrine trains services to detect:
Foreign infiltration and manipulation
Terrorist organisations and cells
Coup conspiracies among elites
Subversive ideologies threatening state security
But Gen Z Madagascar protesters demanded:
Reliable electricity and water (infrastructure)
Healthcare and education reforms (social services)
End to corruption (rule of law)
Equitable opportunities (social justice)
Presidential resignation (political accountability)
These represent governance failures rather than subversive conspiracy. Intelligence services face conceptual challenges when organic popular movements demand basic governance rather than plotting regime overthrow.
The Professional Intelligence Assessment Question
If DGIDIE assessed that:
Protests reflected legitimate grievances, not foreign manipulation
Rajoelina’s tactical responses were strategically inadequate
Violent suppression would create prolonged instability
Madagascar’s long-term stability required political transition
Then DGIDIE’s silence represented professional intelligence judgment rather than institutional failure. The organisation refused to transform legitimate governance demands into security threats simply because they threatened regime survival.
This distinguishes professional intelligence work from secret police functions. Intelligence services assess threats to the state; secret police suppress threats to the regime regardless of legitimacy.
🎯 Key Intelligence Lessons from Madagascar’s October 2025 Uprising
Lesson 1: Intelligence Silence Is Active Choice, Not Passive Failure
DGIDIE’s absence during Madagascar’s crisis demonstrates that intelligence services make conscious institutional choices during regime collapse. The “dog that didn’t bark” framework reveals silence as strategic positioning rather than operational incompetence.
Lesson 2: Regime Protection vs. State Service Creates Operational Dilemma
When regime and state interests diverge, intelligence services must choose institutional loyalty. Madagascar demonstrates that services capable of penetrating assassination plots can simultaneously conclude that suppressing popular uprisings violates professional mandates.
Lesson 3: External Intelligence Patrons Influence Domestic Positioning
French intelligence relationships likely influenced DGIDIE’s neutrality positioning. External patrons prioritising long-term stability over authoritarian support create incentives for intelligence services to maintain distance from violent suppression.
Lesson 4: Popular Mobilisation Can Outlast Regime Intelligence Capacity
Gen Z protesters sustained organising for three weeks despite intelligence services’ theoretical capacity for surveillance and disruption. This demonstrates limits of intelligence power when popular movements reflect genuine governance grievances.
Lesson 5: Military-Intelligence Relationship Determines Transition Outcomes
CAPSAT’s defection to support protesters—echoing their own assessment that continuing repression violated professional ethics—suggests coordination or at minimum parallel thinking with intelligence community positioning.
🔑 Unanswered Questions and Future Intelligence Research
DGIDIE’s role during Madagascar’s October 2025 uprising remains partially opaque without access to:
Internal DGIDIE assessments from August-October 2025
Communications between DGIDIE leadership and Rajoelina
Liaison communications between French and Malagasy intelligence
DGIDIE officer testimony about decision-making during crisis
Post-transition intelligence community restructuring plans
These questions cannot be definitively answered without insider documentation. What remains analytically clear is that DGIDIE’s conspicuous absence represents institutional choice—whether strategic neutrality, professional ethics, external influence, or calculated self-preservation.
The intelligence phenomenon Madagascar exemplifies—service silence during regime collapse—warrants systematic study across African political transitions. As youth-led movements continue reshaping political landscapes across the continent, intelligence services increasingly face the regime-state loyalty dilemma DGIDIE navigated in October 2025.
📍 Key Intelligence Concepts
Intelligence neutrality doctrine
Regime vs state service
Institutional survival strategies
Intelligence ethics during uprisings
Strategic silence as operational choice
External patron influence on intelligence positioning
🔗 Related Intelligence Analysis
Intelligence services during Arab Spring
African intelligence architecture transformation
French intelligence in Francophone Africa
Youth-led protest movement intelligence challenges
HUMINT limitations against popular mobilisation
Please consider becoming a paid subscriber
You can also donate.