March 2021 CoupCast Update
Myanmar, Zimbabwe and Cape Verde face the highest risk of coup this month. In Myanmar, violent repression against those protesting last month’s coup escalated toward the end of February with the military killing at least 18 people on Feb. 28.
CoupCast is a machine learning based early warning forecasting platform for estimating the risk of illegal leadership turnover each month for every country across the globe. These updates provide insight into technical changes/updates, notable events in the previous month, and a more in-depth overview of what to expect in the new month coming forward.
The official web dashboard for CoupCast can be found here and information regarding the underlying data (REIGN) and updates to our monthly data can be found here.
Feel free to reach out to either myself (mfrank@oneearthfuture.org) or Clayton Besaw (cbesaw@oneearthfuture.org) for any questions regarding our CoupCast platform or analyses contained in the updates.
March 2021 CoupCast Updates
Data and algorithm updates:
- Fixed a bug regarding the dropping of Warlordism from the regime type variable. Yemen and Libya briefly had no recorded regime type due to this bug.
- Both the REIGN data and regimes list are now fixed as of February 8.
Risk forecast for March 2021:
Myanmar’s military government, having taken power on February 1st in an early-morning coup, has faced significant domestic protests over the past month. Violent repression by the government reached a peak on February 28 when police killed at least 18 individuals throughout the country.
As protests have continued, the military junta stated its intention to hand over power via elections without specifying a date while they have also announced a year-long state of emergency.
Meanwhile, the United States has imposed sanctions on ten top-ranking members of the junta, however, some members of the junta, including the head General Min Aung Hlaing, were already under American sanctions.
Regionally, ASEAN nations have called for the release of Aung San Suu Kyi and condemned the violence against protesters, but have stopped short of calling for sanctions against the junta.
Looking forward, Myanmar’s coup risk is projected to fall in the summer before experiencing two spikes in the fall/winter.
Similarly, Zimbabwe is projected to have numerous spikes in coup risk throughout the year, most likely due to extreme economic difficulties that are being exacerbated by the ongoing pandemic. The country has received 200,000 vaccine doses from the Chinese company Sinopharm while president Emerson Mnangagwa has threatened to bar those who refuse the vaccine from being able to work.
Meanwhile, both Cape Verde and the Republic of Congo are experiencing spikes in risk this month due to elections being held. Cape Verde is holding legislative elections this month while Republic of Congo will be holding presidential elections.
As noted in last month’s update, the election outcome in Republic of Congo is not in serious doubt as president Denis Sassou Nguesso seeks to extend his 24 years of consecutive rule. However, the potential for instability is not absent as the aftermath of the previous presidential election in 2016 saw 44 deaths during post-election protests.
Outside of the top 10 countries, Somalia last month failed to hold presidential elections as scheduled which has resulted in president Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed’s term extending beyond its original mandate.
As the country entered a period of constitutional crisis, prime minister Mohamed Hussein Roble negotiated an agreement with regional leaders that postponed planned protests in Mogadishu. However, no new date for elections has been announced, raising concerns that violence may yet erupt in the absence of a more comprehensive political solution.
Briefly examining global trends in coup risk for the rest of the year, CoupCast currently projects a dip in coup risk over the summer before spiking in September and again flattening out in the fall/winter. This still roughly mirrors previous global estimates in which early 2021 displays the highest coup risk for the year.
