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| Republic of Chad جمهورية تشاد République du Tchad | |
|---|---|
 Flag
 Coat of arms
| |
 | |
| Capital and largest city | N'Djamena |
| Official languages | Arabic French |
| Demonym(s) | Chadian |
| Government | Military junta |
• President | Mahamat Déby |
• Prime Minister | Allamaye Halina |
| Area | |
• Total | 1,300,000 km² |
| Population | |
• 2024 estimate | 19,093,595 |
| Currency | Central African CFA franc (XAF) |
Chad, officially the Republic of Chad, is a landlocked African country. It borders Libya to the north, Sudan to the east, the Central African Republic and Cameroon to the south and Nigeria and Niger to the west.
History
Neocolonial rule
Chad's first president after independence, François Tombalbaye, tried to end military cooperation with France but was killed in a coup.[1]
Chad allowed Libyan forces into its northern territory in order to protect it from insurgents. The U.S. and France (the former colonizer) bribed the Chadian government to remove these troops and replace them with the CIA-controlled Organization of African Unity.[2]
The CIA installed Hissène Habré as the leader of Chad in June 1982 with using Chadian forces from Sudan. His secret police killed tens of thousands of people and tortured 200,000 until his fall in 1990. In 2000, while living in Senegal, he was indicted for torturing civilians.[2]
In 1991, the pro-French dictator Idriss Déby took power. He died in 2021 while visiting troops battling against rebels in northern Chad and was succeeded by his son Mahamat.[1]
Decolonization struggle
The opposition group Wakit Tamma began anti-French protests in 2021. By October 2022, police had killed 128 protestors. The junta banned Wakit Tamma and several opposition parties and sentenced 340 to prison.[1]
All private assets belonging to Exxon Mobil were nationalized in March 2023.[3]
2024 elections
Security forces assassinated Ahmed Torabi and Yaya Dillo, the leaders of the Socialist Party without Borders, in February 2024, at the same time the date for the 2024 elections was set for May. France chose Déby as the winner of the election, and he ran against his own Prime Minister, Succès Masra, after opposition candidates were killed or rejected. Déby got 61% of the vote, and Masra got 18.54%.[1]
In order to avoid being overthrown, Déby announced he would end military cooperation with France in November 2024. In December, Chad ordered all French troops to leave the country.[1]
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 Pavan Kulkarni (2024-12-05). "Will Chad deal the final blow against French military presence in Africa’s Sahel?" Peoples Dispatch.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 William Blum (2002). Rogue State: A Guide to the World's Only Superpower: 'A Concise History of United States Global Interventions, 1945 to the Present' (p. 128). [PDF] Zed Books Ltd. ISBN 9781842772201 [LG]
- ↑ “Chad has nationalized all the assets and rights including hydrocarbon permits and exploration and production authorisations that belonged to a subsidiary of Exxon Mobil, the Central African nation’s energy and hydrocarbons ministry said in a statement on Thursday.”
Reutters Staff (2023-03-24). "Chad says it has nationalized all assets owned by Exxon Mobil" Reutters. Retrieved 2023-03-28.