Madagascar’s Biggest And Only Indigenous Carmaker Delivers 74th Car

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Back in 2018, I wrote about Madagascar’s only truly independent and home-grown carmaker, Karenjy. I kinda fell in love with these plucky underdogs back then, and I’m happy to report that the little Malagasy carmaker is still going at it, slowly but steadily, and has just delivered their 74th Mazana II car. This is hot on the heels of their 73rd delivery a month ago, so I’d say things are just humming right along for this maker of rugged fiberglass-bodied little SUVs. Let’s take a look at these fascinating cars, why not? After all, they’re probably the smallest and most obscure carmaker to ever make a Popemobile!

Let’s go into detail about the Popemobile first: back in 2019, when Pope Francis visited Madagascar, his Popemobile was a specially-modified Mazana II:

What a lovely and airy Popemobile! The white steering wheel and dashboard is an especially nice touch, as are those fold-down red-carpeted stairs.

But let’s get back to the Big News: earlier this week, that 74th Mazana II, a nice blue one, was delivered to a customer, as seen on Karenjy’s Facebook page:

https://www.facebook.com/mazanaII/posts/pfbid02HafbM4EkH9JNgtXewMEQ8DpV8ENsNanb5DzZeGExcL486412PAHFhUbES1rvgvCbl?__cft__[0]=AZXc28hkMl4baVEpeBbfHVSuPoesbMowaQeiUh2GnfOtMxn6r4KvJ0Q0IQt5KaB_f8XoloOAhjxZCqhA2WjwjgDMENZARj1iFgy5kShF-YKhOWEyScA2FQnnwyzpr78zp8iLKlkP_TtMT696p_yZ7ZZQ4qFmFeq0LpJ5Mio74hl6hnhJpvHRh_UlPKY7T3EYDLQ0j6_Jtw_U7VBz0oJclrC3&__tn__=%2CO%2CP-R

Look at that tough-looking little car! The Mazana II design appeared relatively recently, in 2015, replacing earlier Mazana (a name that means “stroll” in Malagasy, a refreshingly calm name for a car) cars and pickup trucks. The company was started back in 1984 as a governmental program,  and was shut down in the early ’90s partially because of political turmoil occurring in that era.

In 2008, a French-Malagasy company called Le Relais bought the remnants of the company and continued building pickup trucks while they designed and engineered their next car, the Mazana II.

The design of the Mazana II is deliberately simple and rugged, a car designed for its environment.

Mazana2 Diag

The basic shape is somewhere between a crew cab pickup with a short, covered bed and a tall sedan; there’s plenty of ground clearance, and it can be had with rear-wheel drive or two types of four-wheel drive, one with a locking differential. A Peugeot DV6CM 1.6-liter diesel engine gives power, routed through a  five-speed manual transmisson.

All the glass is flat, for ease of manufacture and replacement. Those door hinges are exposed and easy to replace, and all of the lighting is from off-the-shelf, easily-replaceable units. Also, look at the approach and departure angles on this thing – 30° and 40°, which is pretty respectable!

You can even get all sorts of exciting accessories like snorkels and lights and various guards and roof racks, as seen in this Karenjy promo image:

Mazana Acces

Also note that this one has a more wagon/SUV design with that camper shell-like cover at the rear, which I think actually helps the overall look a great deal.

In some peculiar ways, this is a kind of new car I fantasize about: designed for ease of maintenance and repair from the start, quirky and appealing, a manual transmission, utilitarian but somehow charming. They’re economical, too with a claimed 29 to 39 mpg, and a cost of around just under $16,000 (the costs seem to be on a car-by-car basis, but that appears to be about average). I would daily drive one of these in a heartbeat, and I feel like if this could be sold in America for under $20,000, there would be a real niche that this pleasingly clunky little thing could absolutely own.

So, congratulations, Karenjy! If you’re having a press drive for the Mazana II any time soon, I’d love to check one of these out!

(Thanks to Dogapult!)

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47 thoughts on “Madagascar’s Biggest And Only Indigenous Carmaker Delivers 74th Car”

  1. Well, I’ve recently acquired a car built in Australia, so that’s the 4th continent I’ve gotten a car from (NA, Europe, Asia now Australia). That’d count for Africa if I could get one. The engine in one of my prior cars was made in Brazil but that doesn’t really knock SA off the list.

    Antarctica is gonna be tough

    1. I’m not sure about other carmakers, but both Mercedes-Benz and BMW have imported cars from their South African plants to the US – C-classes and 3-series, IIRC. This was during the 2000s, but there weren’t any build quality concerns, so they may still do it.

      1. Still going strong. Last year 20% of new cars built in South Africa were exported to the US. I believe the new Ford Ranger will be coming from their factory in Pretoria.

  2. How could anyone not like this?In profile its almost a baby Humvee!

    So the high beltline is for security, yet their pope-mobile is apparently designed to let bullets in everywhere? Interesting choice

    1. Less than I bet know it’s location from that “infect the world with your engineered disease game.” Fucking Madagascar, always closing it’s port early.

  8. I love this! This is design with purpose to a very limited budget and with a lot of thought gone to the service and use of the vehicle by the customer outside of its ecosystem. This is the kind of thing I would want to design, not some jerkoff super-ultra-hypercar. It’s probably even the one I’d rather drive.

  11. Anyone have any toast? Cause that’s my jam.

    I’d daily the Poped out one in a heartbeat.
    Imagine the Uber tips you could get running people around the city with it.

  13. This is great. My favorite current production car. Madagascar is such a beautiful country and the people are some of the nicest I’ve ever met. They deserve their own car to be proud of. Here’s to 74 (at the very least) more!

  14. Is that 74 total vehicles assembled since 1984, or since 2008? Either way, I’m not sure that’s enough to qualify as a “production car”. Even Morgan produces 800-850 cars per year.

    1. 74 of this model, the Mazana II. I forget when they started building them, but it’s only been a few years. For one of the poorest countries on Earth, 74 ain’t bad.

      2. Oh I agree. In that situation, the whole thing is pleasantly astounding.I’m just trying to figure out if we can call it a production car.

  15. Jason, you might be interested in the Edison truck. It’s a semi/heavy duty truck that is built from the ground up with serviceability and durability in mind. They just ramped up their YouTube upload schedule a lot, there’s lots of updates on their progress.

  16. I think we found the new Autopian mascot.

    • Doesn’t look quite right yet somehow endearing
    • Comfortable by David’s standards
    • Fast by Jason’s standards
    • Mercedes can drive it in HooptieX
    • Comes in colors
    • Made in a country that most people don’t realize is an actual country.
    • Holds a decent amount of shrimp
    • Can probably be hosed out after said shrimp have gone south

    1. Not so much shrunken hummer, but a baby one with small but chubby features, that’ll one day grow up to be an H2 like mum or an H1 like dad.

  18. I still think someone could find a way to sell a jimny type in the US. Just make a little dirt course in a back parking lot and bill it as a street legal, less aggressive and cheaper side by side. It doesn’t actually have to be off-road capable, just enough so the consumer can hold that image in their head when they drive to the grocery store.

  19. That’s it. I’m pulling what’s left of my money out of Elio and Lordstown and backing these guys. I love a good evolutionary fork.

  24. Someone should tell the guy at 56 seconds into the video, that “easy to push” is not a confidence-inspiring feature to talk about when trying to sell a car.
    .

    1. I mean, if something breaks down on it out in Madagascar, it’s entirely possible that it could be impractical/not cost effective/impossible to get a tow. Easy to push in that sort of environment is definitely a plus.

    2. They probably have to deal with a lot of bad roads it would help to be push-assisted through, so it might not just be breakdowns, but either way, self-sufficient beats dependent in a tough, poor environment with support likely not conveniently available, if at all.

    3. You saw the Grand Tour special in Madagascar, right? Easy to push is definitely a good feature on the “roads” there. IIRC some enterprising Madigascarians made jobs for themselves as pushers through rough sections.

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