ANTANANARIVO, 2 May 2008 (IRIN) - Unlike the thousands of other homeless children in the Madagascan capital of Antananarivo, Tovo considers himself lucky. He and his friend, Jiva, have secured a begging spot near the luxury Tana Plaza Hotel.

Both the children are unwashed, rail thin and clothed in dirty rags. Tovo told IRIN: "We have the best place for finding the rich people. We usually get money for food."

The two 11-years-olds, like the capital's other homeless people, sleep in the open, but the approaching southern hemisphere winter is simply a different kind of discomfort to the summer cyclones that lash the island nation.

"Sometimes the street vendors let us sleep by their fires. The grannies who sleep on the pavements know us; they know we have our own money and we won't steal from them, so they let us stay," said Tovo.

Young male vendors tend to hawk cheap wares like tennis shoes, T-shirts and perfumes from Asia, while middle-aged women sell fruit, vegetables or food cooked on the sidewalks, but they all live in their stalls and sleep where they sell.

"Their numbers proliferate, just like urban poverty. It's the rural exodus and urban migration that doesn't end," said Bertrand Guillemot, director of a film production company specialising in documentaries for humanitarian organisations.

"There are several NGOs [non-governmental organisations] devoted to poverty alleviation for the urban poor, but they are uncoordinated," Guillemot told IRIN.

Despite their constant presence outside one of the capital's finest hotels, social welfare workers have never managed to entice Tovo and Jiva into any of their programmes, and the police are indifferent to their activities.

Neither boy has seen his parents, who live on the city's outskirts near the airport, for months, and begging gives them a better diet. "At home all they can eat are these little tubers that grow in the marsh. Sometimes we eat better from the money we get," Jiva said.

Nevertheless, their income is not assured and they have to be vigilant, occasionally chasing away other street children vying for their prime begging spot.

Madagascar's economic fortunes have been tied to the island's politics. During the 1980s, the country experienced economic growth in the wake of World Bank structural reforms, and in the 1990s as a result of the privatisation of national companies.

But political violence in 2002, coupled with poor infrastructure (only 3 percent of rural households have access to electricity) motivated foreign companies to invest in the neighbouring island of Mauritius with its well-developed tourism sector, or Mozambique and South Africa on the African continent.

The growth of youth gangs

In 2006 the United Nations Development Programme estimated that the literacy rate on Madagascar was about 70 percent, although the island's declining economic fortunes may affect this adversely.

"That [literacy rates] may be changing for the worse. There are so many families uprooted from the countryside, and they are penniless when they come to town. They have no means to see to their children's educations; they don't even know where the schools are," Anjara Rasendratsirof, a social worker, told IRIN.

Two environmental disasters are blamed for accelerating migration from rural to urban areas: a drought that began in 2007 has persisted into 2008, and the impact of two cyclones in February 2008, Fame and Ivan, created emergency conditions in both the north and south of the country.

The rich/poor divide in Antananarivo is reflected in the city's topography. The middle classes occupy the high ground, while the poor compete for space in squalid informal settlements in the city's valleys.

The poorest 10 percent of Madagascar's roughly 20 million people account for less than 2 percent of the nation's GDP, while the richest 10 percent have a 36.6 percent share of the GDP.

"Political parties and leaders fight over control; they use funds for themselves. All money for restoring roads, restoring abandoned neighbourhoods, it does not go to its intended use. The city is not doing its job to provide basic infrastructure. The nationalised utilities - water and electricity - can't keep up with demand, so there are power cuts," Guillemot said.

"Madagascar is living on international aid. The country eats 6 percent of WFP [World Food Programme] food stocks. Government has failed to provide for the basic needs of the people," said Guillemot.

Poor governance degrades middle-class lifestyles and is pushing up crime levels, but it is the poor who fare worst. "There is nothing for the poor. They fend for themselves," said Rasendratsirof.

"In the past three years, the city has become more violent. Government has persistently failed to do its duty to provide security. There is a growing fear of youth crime amongst the people; gangs openly challenge police," said documentary filmmaker Guillemot.

Police engage in gun battles with gangs, whose size and influence is growing to such an extent that they gun down off-duty police officers to avenge the deaths of fellow gang members slain by police.

Tovo and Jiva, taking time off from begging to kick a ragged football around in the street outside the hotel, said when they grow up they want to be gangsters. "Nobody pushes the gangsters around," Jiva said.

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