HISTORY OF FRANCO-TCHADIAN FRIENDSHIP

EMMANUEL MACRON AT THE OBSEQUES

FROM PRESIDENT IDRISS DEBY

The image may look very "Françafrique", as the Parisian underlines it, Emmanuel Macron will attend this Friday morning in N'Djamena, with the Minister of the Quai d'Orsay Jean-Yves Le Drian, at the funeral of the "Marshal of Chad" , President Idriss Déby Itno, killed in action against the rebels of the Fact in the north of the country, then on the scene of the fighting to command the armed forces. I “Idriss Déby, a“ warrior ”had defeated the powerful army of Libyan colonel Gaddafi with his Toyota pick-ups, and overthrew the uncontrollable President Hissène Habré. No French president of the Fifth has ever failed this essential ally in Africa ”.

This professional soldier had just been re-elected for a sixth term at the head of Chad during the presidential election of April 11. He had received 79.32% of the vote according to the provisional official results released on April 19, while his injury had not yet been made public. A plebiscite, while nearly 65% ​​of voters had gone to the polls.

An operation at the border with Libya

Idriss Déby was seriously injured when he went to direct himself, at the age of 68, the fighting of his army in the north of the country against a column of rebels infiltrated, as often, from Libya, several hundred kilometers from N'Djamena . It was there that he was shot, earlier in the weekend. “He took the lead in the heroic fight against the terrorist hordes from Libya. He was wounded during the clashes and died once he was repatriated to N'Djamena ”, detailed on state television the army spokesman, General Azem Bermandoa Agouna. On April 19, Chadian forces claimed to have killed 300 rebels in fighting at the border. Five soldiers had lost their lives there.

A transition ensured by his son

After the death of Chadian President Idriss Déby Itno, who ruled his country for 30 years with an iron fist, his son General Mahamat Idriss Déby is the new strongman of Chad: he takes the head of a military junta and concentrates all the powers. Mahamat Idriss Déby, a young general of the Chadian army aged 37, dissolved the National Assembly and the government. He now occupies the functions of "President of the Republic, Head of State and Supreme Head of the Armed Forces" according to the transitional charter. This 37-year-old four-star general, who has proven himself at the head of the contingentChadian deployed in 2013 in Mali to support the French military intervention "Serval", had been appointed by his father to head the General Directorate of Security Services of State Institutions (DGSSIE), heir to the presidential guard, the best equipped and best organized elite corps in the Chadian army.

"This nevertheless reflects a certain continuity, since it is a military leader who succeeds another soldier, who is more from the same family", reacts Caroline Roussy, researcher at the Institute of International and Strategic Relations (Iris) . And to continue: "What really happened? We have very little information on the circumstances of his death. The transition was resolved extremely quickly, along with the announcement of his death. We can ask ourselves questions. "

For many opponents who have always been repressed by Idriss Déby's regime, this seizure of power is, however, nothing more than a “coup d'état”.

"An institutional coup" for the opposition

Voices are already rising from the ranks of the opposition but also from the army to demand the organization of a national and inclusive dialogue.

About thirty Chadian opposition parties denounced Wednesday "an institutional coup", and called "for the establishment of a transition led by civilians (...) through an inclusive dialogue". The opposition also called for "not to obey the illegal, illegitimate and irregular decisions taken by the Military Transition Committee, in particular the transition charter and the curfew".

Threats are therefore hanging over the new strongman of the regime from all sides. A Zaghawa, like his father. A career soldier, like his father. Young, of course. But Idriss Déby himself came to power at the age of 38, at the head of a rebellion.

With the death of Chadian President Idriss Déby Itno on Tuesday, France loses a pillar of the fight against terrorism in the Sahel. While Chad is the largest contributor to the allied G5-Sahel force, specialists fear that its military commitments will be called into question as Paris plans to gradually reduce its military footprint in the region.

“France is losing an essential ally”.

It is with these words that the French Minister of the Armed Forces, Florence Parly, reacted to the death of the Chadian President, Idriss Déby Itno, on Tuesday, April 20.

The man, who ruled the country with an iron fist for thirty years, was a solid partner of Westerners, Paris in the lead, in the fight against jihadism in the Sahel. Military cooperation between France and Chad is old. The French army has been present there almost permanently since the country's independence in 1960.

The future of Operation Barkhane at stake

Chad is thus the first country to support France in the Sahel for the operation “Serval”, launched the same year to stop the advance of jihadist groups towards the south of Mali, which then became “Barkhane”. A dangerous destabilization of the country for the region, would be a nightmare scenario for France too. The future of Operation Barkhane, whose CP is based in N'Djamena, would be at stake. At the beginning of the year, Chad sent a battalion of 1,200 very seasoned soldiers alongside the Barkhane force against the jihadists. in the “three borders” region (Mali-Niger-Burkina Faso).

“Chad is therefore a strategic lock between very unstable areas, Libya, Sudan, the Central African Republic, the Sahel, Boko Haram, etc., lists a soldier close to the issue. Idriss Déby has always been personally and actively involved in these crises ”.

"A strategic lock between very unstable areas"

Chad is also one of the pillars of the G5-Sahel joint force - also made up of Mauritania, Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger - a military coalition that has supported the French military since 2017. On its own, the country provides nearly a third of the armed forces, 1,850 soldiers out of the 6,000 deployed. It is also the only G5 Sahel country to have deployed a battalion outside its national borders, in Niger, in the so-called “three borders” region known to serve as a refuge for Sahelian jihadist groups. In addition to its involvement in the G5-Sahel, the country provides the second largest contingent within the United Nations Mission in Mali (Minusma). The Chadian army a driving force against the jihadist threat

Idriss Déby had made the Chadian army a driving force against the jihadist threat in the Sahel and Lake Chad region. And for Nigeria, a giant of 200 million inhabitants, his death could have serious consequences in the fight against Boko Haram and against the Islamic State group in West Africa (Iswap). If Chad sinks into chaos, it will have direct consequences for Nigeria and Niger. Chad under Déby has been a bulwark against the influx of terrorists from the Sahel to the Lake Chad region. A period of worrying uncertainty begins with the sudden disappearance of Idriss Déby.

"A period of floating"

However, these all-out military commitments could be called into question with the death of President Déby, experts note. The death of the Chadian president risks “introducing uncertainty,” says Yvan Guichaoua, researcher at the University of Kent.

The succession to the head of power in Chad and the fight against rebels from the north will also have a direct impact on security in the Lake Chad region. "It is almost certain that we will see a battle of succession" in N'Djamena, notes the Nigerian risk consultancy firm SBM Intelligence in a report published this week: "This means that the insurgents will have plenty of time to consolidate their base. on the lake and will be able to move around the area to attack the Nigerian army.

The country's stability threatened

On Tuesday, the CMT made a good commitment to organize “free and democratic” elections, but at the end of a “transition period” of eighteen months. This council brings together, in addition to Mahamat Déby Itno, the base of the old system, ie fifteen generals in all. Speaking on state television, the army spokesman, General Azem Bermandoa Agouna, promised that "new republican institutions will be put in place at the end of the transition by the organization of free elections. , democratic and transparent ”.

Will the new strongman of Chad have the leisure to lead this transition to the end? How will he manage to maintain the unity of a system that was already cracking despite the authority and charisma of his father? The resurgence of old rebellions and the appearance of new groups threaten the stability of the country.

Especially since the Front for Alternation and Concord in Chad (FACT), after announcing the day before that his men had operated a tactical withdrawal, the leader of the rebellion Mahamat Mahdi Ali announced that he was marching on the capital city.

"If the constitutional order had been respected, we would have stopped and been ready to discuss.