It is not difficult to find the political, geopolitical, ideological or even personal reasons behind some of the coups that continue to occur in different areas of the world. But there is another explanation, often neglected but no less important: the economic interest.
On the occasion of two coups completed in 2021 – in Burma in January and in Sudan in October – the generals who wrested power from civilian hands had a huge financial interest in retaining control of the country. In both states, the armed forces are an economic player in their own right, a situation that has recurred in many developing countries for decades. According to Kenneth Roth, executive director of the Human Rights Watch NGO, “an important motivation behind the coups in Burma and Sudan is to be found in the great commercial interests of the two armies, which the leaders do not want to give to civilians. Profits, in these cases, take precedence over democracy ”.
Since the 1970s, in many countries where this situation has arisen, a tug-of-war has been necessary before the army agreed to put aside its economic interests. Often the military has been encouraged to develop its economic activities to generate profits to finance the military, but quickly this industrial and commercial sector has become a source of corruption and an element that has altered the balance between civilians and military. In China, in the 1990s, the People’s Liberation Army (ELP) controlled up to twenty thousand economic activities in all sectors. Only at the beginning of the new millennium did the ELP abandon its latest investments, also due to pressure from the Central Military Commission of the Communist Party, which wanted to regain complete political authority over the army. In the 2000s, this operation was facilitated by several high-profile arrests of corrupt generals who kept the fruits of illegal activities in the garage. On the contrary, in the Egypt of Marshal Abdel Fattah al Sisi the weight of the army in the commendation has returned to being considerable after a period of decline.
Economy in uniform
In Sudan, Transition Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdock, an economist who worked for the United Nations, was overthrown by the military on 25 October after openly attacking the military’s economic activity. Hamdock had proposed a distinction between investments in the defense industry, in his eyes acceptable, and those in other sectors. “It is unthinkable that the army and security services invest in the productive sectors, thus entering into competition with the private sector,” he declared in December 2020. The one launched by Hamdock was a clear signal that at the end of the transition period and cohabitation between military and civilians this unhealthy situation would have been resolved, and the army would have lost its presence in the mining and agricultural sectors where it is very active today. According to unofficial information, the Sudanese army participates in operations for the extraction of gold, the production of rubber and the export of meat, flour and sesame. Military companies pay no taxes and can count on concessions denied to the private sector, and this creates a form of unfair competition. The army chief, General Abdel Fattah al Burhan, author of the 25 October coup, had opposed the idea of forcing the army to abandon its investments, but accepted the possibility of the military paying some taxes. . Today Al Burhan is the absolute leader of the country, so the threat to the interests of the army has disappeared.
In Burma the situation is very similar. The Tatmadaw, the army led by General Min Aung Hlaing who took power in January 2021, constitutes a real state within the state, with deep historical roots and endowed with considerable economic power. The army participates, as is known, in the trafficking of jade and drugs, but above all controls the very official Myanmar economic holding public company (Mehl), a conglomerate present in all sectors, from the production of beer to the textile industry passing through the mines. A US diplomat quoted by Le Monde described Mehl as “one of the most powerful and corrupt organizations in the country”.
These financial interests constitute the strength but also the weakness of the army: after the coup, in fact, several foreign companies have put an end to their participation in joint investments with Mehl, such as the Japanese brewer Kirin or the entrepreneur of Singapore Lim Kaling. The organizations for the defense of human rights propose to directly strike the interests of the army through international sanctions in order to punish the perpetrators of the coups. This strategy of pressure should be generalized to favor the return to democracy.
Clearly, economic interests are not the only cause of the instability and irruption of the military into the power game. Each country and each situation has its own dynamics, its own external influences, its own history and its own geography. But we must not underestimate the importance of the machine of corruption represented by the investments of the armed forces in the productive economy. The director of Human Rights Watch is right: for the coup leaders “profits take precedence over democracy”.
(Translation by Andrea Sparacino)
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