Chad President Idriss Deby Killed while visiting front lines
The Chadian army says President Idriss Deby has died, just days after being re-elected to a sixth term. VOA News
Speaking on state television Tuesday, an army spokesman said Deby was killed while visiting troops on the frontline of a fight against rebels, who had advanced in recent days toward the Chadian capital, N’Djamena. The spokesman did not give details on how Deby was killed.
The spokesman said a military council has been set up to rule the country. He said the council will be led by Deby’s son, General Mahamat Idriss Deby Itno, 37.
There has been no independent confirmation on the circumstances of the Chadian president’s death.
Deby had ruled the Central African country since coming to power in a December 1990 coup, making him one of Africa’s longest-serving leaders. Critics called him an autocrat, while in the West he was seen an important ally in the fight against Islamist extremist groups in West Africa and the Sahel, like Nigeria-based Boko Haram.
On Monday, Deby was declared the winner of Chad’s April 11 election with 79 percent of the vote.
His campaign said that day that Deby was going to the front line to join army troops battling what he called terrorists.
Rebels based in Libya to the north had attacked a border post on election day and had moved hundreds of kilometers toward the capital.
On Friday, the U.S. embassy in Chad ordered the departure of non-emergency U.S. government employees, citing the rebels’ advance and possibility of violence in the city.
HISTORY: CIA files
A long civil war began as a tax revolt in 1965 and soon set the Muslim north and east against the southern-led government. Even with the help of French combat forces, the Tombalbaye government was never able to quell the insurgency. Tombalbaye’s rule became more irrational and brutal, leading the military to carry out a coup in 1975 and to install Gen. Felix Malloum, a southerner, as head of state. In 1978, Malloum’s government was broadened to include more northerners. Internal dissent within the government led the northern prime minister, Hissein Habre, to send his forces against the national army in the capital city of N’Djamena in February 1979. The resulting civil war amongst the 11 emergent factions was so widespread that it rendered the central government largely irrelevant. At that point, other African governments decided to intervene.
A series of four international conferences held first under Nigerian and then Organization of African Unity (OAU) sponsorship attempted to bring the Chadian factions together. At the fourth conference, held in Lagos, Nigeria, in August 1979, the Lagos accord was signed. This accord established a transitional government pending national elections. In November 1979, the National Union Transition Government (GUNT) was created with a mandate to govern for 18 months. Goukouni Oueddei, a northerner, was named President; Colonel Kamougue, a southerner, Vice President; and Habre, Minister of Defense. This coalition proved fragile; in January 1980, fighting broke out again between Goukouni’s and Habre’s forces. With assistance from Libya, Goukouni regained control of the capital and other urban centers by year’s end. However, Goukouni’s January 1981 statement that Chad and Libya had agreed to work for the realization of complete unity between the two countries generated intense international pressure and Goukouni’s subsequent call for the complete withdrawal of external forces. Libya’s partial withdrawal to the Aozou Strip in northern Chad cleared the way for Habre’s forces to enter N’Djamena in June. French troops and an OAU peacekeeping force of 3,500 Nigerian, Senegalese, and Zairian troops (partially funded by the United States) remained neutral during the conflict.
Habre continued to face armed opposition on various fronts, and was brutal in his repression of suspected opponents, massacring and torturing many during his rule. In the summer of 1983, GUNT forces launched an offensive against government positions in northern and eastern Chad with Libyan support. In response to Libya’s direct intervention, French and Zairian forces intervened to defend Habre, pushing Libyan and rebel forces north of the 16th parallel. In September 1984, the French and the Libyan governments announced an agreement for the mutual withdrawal of their forces from Chad. By the end of the year, all French and Zairian troops were withdrawn. Libya did not honor the withdrawal accord, and its forces continued to occupy the northern third of Chad.
Southern rebel commando groups (CODO) in southern Chad were broken up by government massacres in 1984. In 1985 Habre briefly reconciled with some of his most powerful opponents including the Chadian Democratic Front and the Coordinating Action Committee of the Democratic Revolutionary Council. Goukouni also began to rally toward Habre, and with his support Habre successfully expelled Libyan forces from most of Chadian territory. A cease-fire between Chad and Libya held from 1987 to 1988, and negotiations over the next several years led to the 1994 International Court of Justice decision granting Chad sovereignty over the Aouzou strip, effectively ending Libyan occupation.
However, rivalry between Hadjerai, Zaghawa and Gorane groups within the government grew in the late 1980s. In April 1989, Idriss Deby, one of Habre’s leading generals and a Zaghawa, defected and fled to Darfur in Sudan, from which he mounted a Zaghawa-supported series of attacks on Habre (a Gorane). In December 1990, with Libyan assistance and no opposition from French troops stationed in Chad, Deby’s forces successfully marched on N’Djamena. After 3 months of provisional government, Deby’s Patriotic Salvation Movement (MPS) approved a national charter on February 28, 1991, with Deby as president.
In the next 2 years, Deby faced at least two coup attempts. Government forces clashed violently with rebel forces (including the Movement for Democracy and Development, MDD, National Revival Committee for Peace and Democracy (CSNPD), Chadian national Front (FNT) and the Western Armed Forces, FAO) near Lake Chad and in southern regions of the country. Earlier French demands for the country to hold a National Conference resulted in the gathering of 750 delegates representing political parties (legalized in 1992), the government, trade unions and the army to discuss creation of a pluralist democratic regime.
However unrest continued, sparked in part by large-scale killings of civilians in southern Chad. The CSNPD, led by Kette Moise and other southern groups entered into a peace agreement with government forces in 1994, which later broke down. Two new groups, the Armed Forces for a Federal Republic (FARF) led by former Kette ally Laokein Barde and the Democratic Front for Renewal (FDR), and a reformulated MDD clashed with government forces 1994-95.
Talks with political opponents in early 1996 did not go well, but Deby announced his intent to hold presidential elections in June. Deby won the country’s first multi-party presidential elections with support in the second round from opposition leader Kebzabo, defeating General Kamougue (leader of the 1975 coup against Tombalbaye). Deby’s MPS party won 63 of 125 seats in the January 1997 legislative elections. International observers noted numerous serious irregularities in presidential and legislative election proceedings.
By mid-1997 the government signed peace deals with FARF and the MDD leadership and succeeded in cutting off the groups from their rear bases in the Central African Republic and Cameroon. Agreements also were struck with rebels from the National Front of Chad (FNT) and Movement for Social Justice and Democracy in October 1997. However, peace was short-lived, as FARF rebels clashed with government soldiers, finally surrendering to government forces in May 1998. Barde was killed in the fighting, as were hundreds of other southerners, most civilians.
Since October 1998 Chadian Movement for Justice and Democracy (MDJT) rebels, led by Youssuf Togoimi, have skirmished with government troops in the Tibesti region, resulting in hundreds of civilian, government, and rebel casualties, but little ground won or lost. No active armed opposition has emerged in other parts of Chad, although Kette Moise, following senior postings at the Ministry of Interior, mounted a smallscale local operation near Moundou which was quickly and violently suppressed by government forces in late 2000.
Deby, in the mid-1990s, gradually restored basic functions of government and entered into agreements with the World Bank and IMF to carry out substantial economic reforms. Oil exploitation in the southern Doba region began in June 2000, with World Bank Board approval to finance a small portion of a project aimed at transport of Chadian crude through a 1000-km. buried pipeline through Cameroon to the Gulf of Guinea. The project establishes unique mechanisms for World Bank, private sector, government, and civil society collaboration to guarantee that future oil revenues benefit local populations and result in poverty alleviation. Success of the project will depend on intensive monitoring efforts to ensure that all parties keep their commitments. Debt relief was accorded to Chad in May 2001.
Deby won a flawed 63% first-round victory in May 2001 presidential elections after legislative elections were postponed until spring 2002. Six opposition leaders were arrested (twice) and one opposition party activist was killed following the announcement of election results. However, despite claims of government corruption, favoritism of Zaghawas, and security forces abuses, opposition party and labor union calls for general strikes and more active demonstrations against the government have been unsuccessful.
GOVERNMENT AND POLITICAL CONDITIONS
A strong executive branch headed by President Deby dominates the Chadian political system. Following his military overthrow of Habre in December 1990, Deby won presidential elections in 1996 and 2001. The constitutional basis for the government is the 1996 constitution, under which the president is limited to two terms of office. The president has the power to appoint the prime minister and the Council of State (or cabinet), and exercises considerable influence over appointments of judges, generals, provincial officials and heads of Chad’s parastatal firms. In cases of grave and immediate threat, the president, in consultation with the National Assembly President and Council of State, may declare a state of emergency. Most of the Deby’s key advisors are members of the Zaghawa clan, although some southern and opposition personalities are represented in his government.