Madagascar's Military Rulers Tighten Grip; SADC Demands Action

Eight months after seizing power in October 2025, Madagascar’s military-led transition has shifted decisively toward authoritarianism. The Southern African Development Community (SADC) has issued its strongest demands yet to Antananarivo, while opposition figures face arrest, the judiciary operates under regime control, and Russian influence has embedded itself throughout state institutions. The regional organization’s assessment no longer describes a transition going off course; it documents a regime entrenching itself.

The SADC declaration marks a turning point in international pressure. The organization now demands the liberation of political prisoners, an end to arbitrary arrests of opposition leaders and Generation Z activists, and the return of political exiles. This is more than a diplomatic warning. It is a formal acknowledgment of failure.

The statement arrived days after June developments surrounding the Constitutional High Court (HCC), Madagascar’s apex judicial body. Two judges facing charges of regime destabilization resigned on June 18 and were replaced within twenty-four hours. Three additional court members had already been removed by decree in December 2025. The HCC, which validates election results and anchors Madagascar’s constitutional system, no longer provides minimal guarantees of independence. The credibility of any eventual transition to democratic elections is increasingly questioned openly. Even if voting occurs, its authenticity now remains in doubt.

Russia’s deepening institutional presence compounds these concerns. National Assembly President Siteny Randrianasoloniaiko traveled to Moscow in November 2025 to establish multidimensional cooperation spanning energy and media relations. More recently, the Independent National Electoral Commission (CENI) conducted training in Russia, a country whose electoral standards are not internationally recognized as reliable. This rapprochement extends beyond diplomacy into institutional structures themselves, steering the transition toward a model that liberal democracies view with justified concern.

The political climate has deteriorated sharply over the past three months. Opposition figures, including some who supported or tolerated the October 2025 coup, are being systematically silenced. Some have begun viewing the previous Rajoelina period with less criticism, even nostalgia.

In early June, Deputy Antoine Rajerison lost his parliamentary immunity after the National Assembly voted to strip it. Colonel Patrick Rakotomamonjy, a former presidential aide and October uprising figure, was arrested in April on charges of plotting against the state, weeks after publicly denouncing corruption within the regime. Paul Rabary, head of the Ny Fireneko party and former Education Minister, was imprisoned in May for threatening state security, based on communications whose interpretation remains contested by his supporters. Each case follows an identical pattern: vague accusations, swift arrest, and murky legal justification.

Civil society faces mounting hostility. Generation Z Madagascar leaders have been arrested at night following public breaks with the junta. Amnesty International condemned, in March, the use of deliberately vague accusations of criminal conspiracy or national security threats to silence activists.

Meanwhile, the government has announced plans for social media regulation legislation. Press freedom has not yet faced direct assault, but such a law would restrict precisely the digital platforms where Gen Z built its effectiveness.

The Catholic Church, representing nearly one-quarter of the population, issued an unambiguous statement in May condemning the arrest of those with differing political views and demanding a clear electoral roadmap. This warning carries weight the regime cannot long ignore.

Russia’s military footprint expanded significantly when the Africa Corps, the Russian military structure that succeeded the Wagner Group on the continent, completed training of over one hundred Malagasy soldiers in Antananarivo, including special forces and the presidential guard. Moscow now trains the men protecting Colonel Randrianirina. This Russian-backed praetorian guard functions as regime insurance and fundamentally distorts internal power dynamics, making institutional pressure or leadership change far more uncertain. The junta’s connection to Moscow is no longer merely diplomatic; it has become a security arrangement.

The diagnosis from Amnesty International, the Catholic Church, and now the SADC no longer constitutes warning. It describes a system consolidating itself. Madagascar’s checks on power are being methodically eliminated, opposition criminalized, and security institutions locked in with Moscow’s support. The transition no longer opens democratic horizons; it stabilizes a durable political order built on internal control and external alignment. This represents another democratic facade added to a familiar continental pattern. In this process, the United Nations and liberal democracies are no longer passive observers.

A fundamental question remains rarely posed directly to Washington, Brussels, Paris, London, Tokyo, and Canberra: at what point does a transition cease being an unstable interlude and become a regime that international actors ultimately accept, sometimes through inaction itself?