Politics

Chad: Interim president Deby declared winner of disputed election

Published

6 months ago

May 11, 2024

The state electoral commission of Chad has announced that interim President Mahamat Idriss Deby has secured an absolute victory in the presidential election held on May 6, receiving more than 61% of the votes according to provisional figures. This declaration was made despite the main opposition candidate claiming victory for himself.

Chad’s military regime has successfully transitioned back to constitutional governance through democratic elections, making it the first country in West and Central Africa affected by a coup to do so. However, certain opposition parties have expressed dissatisfaction with regards to worries of electoral manipulation.

In anticipation of the results announcement, a significant number of security troops have been stationed at prominent crossroads in the capital city of N’Djamena, due to the prevailing high tensions.

Ahmed Bartichet, the head of the National Election Management Agency, announced that Deby had obtained 61.3% of the vote, surpassing the required 50% threshold to avoid a second round of voting.

According to him, Succes Masra, both Deby’s prime minister and the main opposition candidate, won 18.53% of the votes.

Before the event, Masra declared triumph during a live transmission on Facebook and urged security personnel and his followers to resist what he referred to as an endeavour to obtain the votes fraudulently.

“A small number of individuals believe they can make people believe that the election was won by the same system that has been ruling Chad for decades,” he said.

“To all Chadians who voted for change, who voted for me, I say: mobilise. Do it calmly, with a spirit of peace,” he said.
The contested outcomes conclude a tense campaign season characterized by the assassination of opposition leader Yaya Dillo, the exclusion of important opposition members from the list of candidates, and other concerns that critics argue have undermined the integrity of the process.

Although Masra attracted larger-than-anticipated audiences during the campaign, observers had largely foreseen that the winner would be Deby. Deby assumed control after rebels assassinated his father, Idriss Deby, who had ruled for a long time, in April 2021.

“Post-election protests are possible, though the threat of police repression could dissuade many people from taking to the streets,” Crisis Group experts said ahead of the vote.

Foreign observers are keenly monitoring the election. While neighbouring countries in the insurgency-ravaged Sahel area, such as Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger, have requested the withdrawal of Paris and other Western powers and sought backing from Moscow, Chad is the only Sahel state that still has a significant French military presence.

Security and the economy have been important topics throughout the campaign. Chad, a country with limited development, has faced additional challenges due to many factors such as heatwaves caused by climate change and a refugee problem resulting from the civil conflict in Sudan.

Related Topics:#CHAD Featured Mahamat Idriss Deby

Click to comment

Politics

Ugandan opposition politician abducted, wife says

Published

1 day ago

November 20, 2024

Ifeoluwa Dada

According to his wife on Wednesday, a well-known opposition leader from Uganda, Kizza Besigye was abducted during a book launch in Kenya over the weekend, taken to Uganda, and detained at a military prison in Kampala.

Despite his rejection of the results, Besigye has run against Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni four times and lost each time, claiming voting intimidation and fraud. He has been arrested several times in the past.

“I request the (government) of Uganda to release my husband Dr Kizza Besigye from where he is being held immediately,” said his wife Winnie Byanyima.

It was not immediately possible to get in touch with a Ugandan military spokesperson for comment.

“As police we don’t have him, so we can’t make any comment,” Ugandan police spokesman Kituuma Rusoke told Reuters.
A spokesperson for Kenya’s national police did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Besigye’s Forum for Democratic Change (FDC) party, one of Uganda’s major opposition parties, had 36 members arrested by Kenyan police in July. They were then deported to Uganda and accused of terrorism-related charges.

On the social networking site X, Byanyima stated that Besigye, who served as Museveni’s doctor during the guerrilla war but later turned into a vocal opponent, was abducted on Saturday as senior Kenyan opposition leader Martha Karua was launching a book.

“I am now reliably informed that he is in a military jail in Kampala,” said Byanyima, who is the executive director of UNAIDS, the United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS. “We his family and his lawyers demand to see him. He is not a soldier. Why is he being held in a military jail?”

Museveni’s administration has been charged with repeatedly violating the human rights of opposition leaders and followers, including extrajudicial executions, torture, and unlawful detentions.

Politics

Sudan army chief Burhan meets US envoy

Published

2 days ago

November 20, 2024

Ifeoluwa Dada

The United States special envoy to Sudan has made his first trip to the African nation, hoping to bring an end to a horrific war and boost relief to millions of people in need.

After being appointed Washington’s ambassador to Sudan in February, Tom Perriello visited Port Sudan, the army-led government’s de facto capital on the Red Sea coast.

For the first time since the evacuation of the U.S. embassy in April 2023 due to the conflict between the Sudanese Armed Forces and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), a top U.S. official visited the nation.

“We feel an enormous amount of urgency to end this crisis and to ensure that we can … help to get food and medicine and life-saving support to the 20 million people plus that are in need,” a State Department official said before the trip.

Over 25 million people, or half of Sudan’s population, require help, according to the U.N., as hunger has spread to one area and over 11 million people have abandoned their homes.

Sudan’s sovereign council stated in a statement that Perriello spoke with tribal, government, and humanitarian figures in addition to Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, the country’s army head.

During what the council described as a “lengthy, comprehensive, and frank” discussion, the two men talked about how to provide humanitarian help and how to end the war through a political process.

“The U.S. envoy presented several suggestions which the head of the sovereign council agreed to,” the statement said.

Although the army declined to join U.S.-mediated peace negotiations in Geneva earlier this year, the meetings did obtain commitments from the warring parties to increase access to aid.

A power battle between the army and the RSF preceded a planned shift to civilian government, which is why the conflict broke out more than a year ago.

Perriello discussed “the need to cease fighting, enable unhindered humanitarian access, including through localized pauses in the fighting to allow for the delivery of emergency relief supplies, and commit to a civilian government,” a State Department statement said.

“Right now, I think there’s a key opportunity to build on the expansion of humanitarian aid,” the State Department official stated, emphasising the need for relief corridors to the most battle-ravaged areas, such as al-Fashir, Sennar, and parts of the capital Khartoum, even though the U.S. would continue to pursue a more comprehensive ceasefire and negotiations.

Last Monday, Sudan’s sovereign council announced that it would prolong the temporary opening of the Adre border crossing with Chad. According to relief organisations, this crossing is essential for delivering food and other supplies to famine-prone portions of the Darfur and Kordofan regions.

An RSF official stated at a press conference in Nairobi that while they were still amenable to peace, they had doubts about the army’s readiness.

“They do not listen to any language but that of the rifle, and so we will continue to talk to them in the language they understand,” said Brigadier General Omar Hamdan.