Sangar Incident

The Sangar Incident (Pasdani: واقعه سنگر; Vagheah-yi Sangar; Rahelian: حادثة سانغار; Ḥādiṯa al-Sangah) was a foiled plot to overthrow the Zorasani government under State President Ekrem Dalan and First Minister Izzat al-Din Kahala in mid-2004. The conspiracy involved a group of junior officers housed at the Sangar Army and Air Force Base and was stopped pre-emptively by the Central Command Council.

The plot came at a time of growing social and economic upheaval as a result of the neo-liberal and secular reforms of the XX-XX government. The success of the previous XX-XX reformist government in pushing the military out of politics had fostered tensions, which were deepened by the military’s sense that the successive liberal governments were violating the foundational principles and values of the Union of Zorasani Irfanic Republics. In late 2003, the plotters led by Major Sadiollah Khodapavar began planning for the overthrow of the government and the instituting of a military dictatorship. They progressed as far as securing forged documents authorising the deployment of military forces in and around the capital, Zahedan. The plot was foiled by the successful surveilling of the plotters by the Inter-Services Discipline Office, who were arrested on 24 May 2004, all were subsequently sentenced to death for sedition by a Special Military Tribunal.

The foiled plot marked a short-lived improvement in civil-military relations. However, the plot stands as a precursor to the Turfan, a period of violent civil and social unrest that resulted in the electoral defeat of the XX-XX government and the liberal-reformist movement in Zorasani politics. The Tufan ultimately resulted in the restoration of entrenched military domination over politics and a return to radical ideological governance by civilian hardliners in alliance with the military.

Origins

Liberal governments and reforms

In 1990, the liberal-centre left Society for National Transformation political bloc secured a majority in that year’s general election, marking the first time a non-military backed and Renovationist political group had won an election. The reformist government under State President Abdelraouf Wazzan and First Minister Faris-Ali Erekat launched a major plan for constitutional, economic and social reform. Their economic reforms resulted in securing Zorasan as one of the fastest growing economies in the world for over a decade and elevated an estimated 56 million people out of poverty. Their social reforms introduced a vast majority of women into the work force and they succeeded in opening the nation’s media, while reducing censorship.

The Wazzan-Erekat government however, ensured that it maintained a cordial relationship with the military, even as it won key votes in pushing the military out of politics. In 1994, the government adopted the State Defence Agreement, in which the military would acquiesce to the government’s reforms in exchange for a series of promises, such as relinquishing civil control over the defence budget, permitting the continue presence of military-run printed and broadcast media outlets and the abolition of the State Defence Council and its powers being transferred to the Central Command Council. This agreement consolidated the Wazzan-Erekat government’s ability to liberalise and open both the economy and Zorasani democracy.

Despite a family scandal forcing the resignation of First Minister Erekat, his successor, Zakaria Moradi and State President Wazzan would see the SNT government re-elected in 1995 with an increased majority. The expectation of many that further reforms would established a civil-military relationship operated by the advanced nations, with complete civilian oversight never came to fruition and was regularly rejected by the government. The failure also to pursue the removal of Irfanic clerical influence from government, particularly the public morality campaigns would result in the SNT selecting the more radical Ekrem Dalan and Izzat Din-Kahala as the candidates for State President and First Minister respectively for the 2000 general election. Their selection resulted in a shift of the SNT toward the left and its renaming to the National Reform Front.

The Dalan-Kahala ticket sparked concern both among the military and clerical establishments and both would actively support the Renovationist parties during the election, though the NRF would be re-elected for a third five-year term with a reduced majority.

Dalan-Kahala Government and tensions

The Dalan-Kahala government’s top priority was further reform of the economy, which also included the complete privatisation or shuttering of military owned companies. Ekrem Dalan, who had previously served as a chief economic adviser under the Wazzan-Moradi government was a staunch supporter of neo-liberalism and believed the semi-statist nature of Zorasan’s economy would eventually hinder its development. In a speech in 2000, Dalan said, “there can be no state in the economy and that means no state whatsoever, need it be said that the military is the state.”

Tensions began to emerge between the military and the government, not only over its plans to remove the military from key sectors of the economy, but also its plans to restore the State Defence Council and government control over the defence budget. These tensions though rarely entering public view on occasion between 2000 and 2005 did so. The most controversial incident prior to the coup plot was the use of the General Intelligence Directorate by the military to leak details of corruption among the NRF’s state-level elected officials. In turn, the Union Office for Auditing in 2003, revealed the embezzlement of funds from military-owned companies by leading officers.

It was not until the neo-liberal economic reforms that opposition to the government expanded beyond the top ranks of the armed forces to the wider officer corps. The near shock therapy like reforms not only resulted in mass lay-offs numbering into the low millions by 2004 but caused severe declines in real wages for non-professional workers, exacerbating the income disparity that emerged during the 1990s. Coupled with the oft unsubtle message by the Dalan-Kahala government of instituting outright secularism nationally, many junior officers saw the government as actively destroying the values and principles of the Union. The agitation of junior officers coincided with growing popular resentment toward the reforms, which would ultimately boil over during the Turfan.

It is widely believed that the senior leadership of the armed forces were aware of the radicalisation of junior officers, and either ignored it through shared concerns and opposition to the government, or opted to allow it to spread to secure a tool to which it could pressure the civilian government into halting its economic and social reforms.