Long serving Chad President Idriss Deby killed

N’Djamena, Chad | THE INDEPENDENT & XINHUA |  Reports out of N’Djamena indicate that Chad’s newly re-elected long serving President Idriss Deby has been killed.

Chadian army spokesperson General Azem Bermandoa Agouna made the announcement on TV and radio, and indicated he died Tuesday of injuries suffered at the weekend fighting rebels in the north of the Sahel country.

“The President of the Republic, Head of State, Supreme Head of the Armed Forces, Idriss Deby Itno, has just had his last breath in defending territorial integrity on the battlefield. It is with deep bitterness that we announce to the Chadian people the death on Tuesday of Marshal of Chad”, declared General Agouna.

These details could not be independently confirmed, but the army also announced that his son, General Mahamat Idriss Deby Itno, a four-star general, will replace him as head of the military council.

Idriss Deby had just won the absolute majority in the first round of the presidential election. According to the CENI, Deby had received 3,663,431 votes, or 79.32% of all votes cast. Voter turnout was 64.81 percent.

Since April 11, the polling day, militants of the Front for Alternation and Concord in Chad (FACT), an armed rebel group based in neighboring Libya, have made incursions into the province of Tibesti, in northern Chad.

More than 300 FACT rebels were killed and 150 others, including three top leaders, taken prisoner last Saturday in Chad’s western Kanem province, a Chadian army spokesperson said.

The battleground is some 300 km north of the capital N’Djamena.

Since Monday, security in the capital city had been beefed up with tanks deployed in major strategic positions.

The government called on the population to stay calm, saying the security reinforcement was misinterpreted, and there is no particular threat to fear.

Several opposition parties and civil society organizations in Chad called on the warring parties to reach a ceasefire, and asked the government to open an inclusive national dialogue to ease tensions.

In early March, three opposition candidates announced their withdrawal from the race, including Saleh Kebzabo, heavyweight of the opposition who wants to boycott the election. Kebzabo came second in the 2016 presidential election.