Ghislaine Dupont and Claude Verlon Scholarship: Madagascar's Nadia Razafimahatratry and Yves Ramarosandratana Named 2026 Winners

Nadia Razafimahatratry, 34, a journalist at the Regional Directorate of Communication and Culture in the Itasy region, and Yves Ramarosandratana, 32, a technician at Radio FAFI, are the two Malagasy winners of the Ghislaine Dupont and Claude Verlon Scholarship, awarded each year by RFI since 2014 in tribute to our colleagues murdered in northern Mali on November 2, 2013.

Published on: 02/11/2026 - 17:38

Journalist Nadia Razafimahatratry and technician Yves Ramarosandratana were named winners of this 13th edition on November 2 at the Institut Français of Antananarivo. The 2026 Ghislaine Dupont and Claude Verlon Scholarship was open to Malagasy media professionals under 35 years of age with at least two years of professional experience.

Five journalists and five technicians participated in two weeks of training workshops held at the headquarters of Madagascar's public radio and television broadcasting office (ORTM), a partner of the event.

At the end of this training, the journalist candidates produced a report on the theme "Dialogue and Tolerance," while the technicians created an audio-only piece dedicated to "Craftsmanship and artisanal trades in Madagascar."

Nadia Razafimahatratry, 34, stood out with "The Closed Doors of Domestic Violence in Madagascar." A report that "lets us hear rare and powerful testimonies, gathered in a difficult neighborhood of the capital," emphasized the jury, which "praised the courage of the subject, lifting the veil on a reality that remains taboo and rarely covered in the media, as well as the quality of its writing."

In Madagascar, 41% of women are victims of domestic violence. On the Great Island, the scourge all too often runs into a wall of silence and denial, locked in place by a persistent cultural tenet, "Nitoukatchane Si Ahak": the imperative that dirty laundry is washed within the family. To break this taboo, the Koloaïn association deploys a unique approach by reaching out to families living in precarious conditions and experiencing violence.

"The Closed Doors of Domestic Violence in Madagascar," by Nadia Razafimahatratry

Yves Ramarosandratana, 32, caught the attention of the jury—chaired by Mounia Daoudi, deputy director of RFI in charge of Africa Information, and made up of seven other media professionals—with the piece "Blacksmith, the Metal Sculptor." Ramarosandratana, who is also an electronics engineer specializing in multimedia production, distinguished himself through "the quality of the sound recording and mixing, as well as the audio structure of the report," the jurors noted.

Thirty-five kilometers west of Antananarivo, the capital of Madagascar, the sounds of wrought iron welcome visitors to the village of Mangatany. The blacksmith workshops there are a legacy of the colonial era. Here, René makes a plow to be pulled by oxen. An ancestral tool, essential to Malagasy farmers. Report by Arison Sandanirine Yves.

"Blacksmith, the Metal Sculptor," by Yves Ramarosandratana

Nadia Razafimahatratry and Yves Ramarosandratana will benefit from a four-week training course in Paris, fully funded by RFI, during the first quarter of 2027.

This 2026 Scholarship was organized in partnership with the Sciences Po Journalism School, the National Audiovisual Institute (INA), ORTM, and the Friends of Ghislaine Dupont and Claude Verlon.

On November 2, 2013, our RFI colleagues Ghislaine Dupont and Claude Verlon were murdered in Kidal, northern Mali. They were on an assignment when an al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb commando abducted them before executing them less than an hour later on the outskirts of the town. This scholarship has honored their memory and their work since 2014.

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