An old saying maintains that “Those who don’t learn from history are destined to repeat it.” But an arguably more accurate take on that sentiment was espoused by author Mark Twain, who asserted that “History doesn’t repeat itself, but it often rhymes.” That thinking is perhaps one of the most precise ways of describing the history of the African island nation of Madagascar since gaining its independence from France in 1960. In the time since then, the country has undergone a series of uprisings between rival factions on the right and left, with the nation’s residents – the Malagasy people – cau...