Executive Summary

In October, Madagascar suffered its fifth coup since 1975. While this fits a pattern of non-democratic government upsets in Africa over many decades, it is unique as part of a batch of recent overthrows on the continent, only the second outside the Sahel, and as going against international hopes that the Malagasy had broken free of the cycle of overthrows with its recent ranking as Africa’s 12th strongest democracy.

Under the new military rule, Russia will likely move quickly to shore up its long-standing interest in Madagascar, partly by exploiting the aid vacuum created by U.S. aid cuts. We cannot rule out the possibility of Moscow’s involvement in the recent change of government. The regime change will likely affect the US and allied critical mining projects. Additionally, we cannot rule out the possibility of state intervention, possibly under pressure from Moscow, to cancel them.