Chad Celebrates Golden Jubilee Today

The golden jubilee celebrations of the independence of Chad reach their peak today with a military parade at the “Place du Cinquantenaire” in N’Djamena. Scores of Heads of State and Government are present for the event. President Paul Biya and First Lady Chantal Biya arrived in N’Djamena yesterday evening and were welcomed by President Idriss Deby Itno and wife as well as thousands of Cameroonians in CPDM outfit. Cameroon’s presidential couple last evening attended the official banquet at the “Cite des Dix Villas”. The city of N’Djamena had witnessed a facelift ahead of its independence celebrations. The road infrastructure and the new buildings that have cropped up are testimony to the rapid economic progress that the country has been witnessing in recent years.

Chad gained its independence from France under the leadership of François Tombalbaye. A long lasting civil war erupted barely five years after independence. In 1979, rebels from the North conquered the capital. After a series of bloody scuffles, Hisene Habre emerged leader. He was overthrown in 1990 and for quite some time now, Chad has seen some stability and economic progress under the Presidency of Idriss Deby Itno. Chad’s constitution provides for an executive President. The President is directly elected by popular vote for a five-year term that is renewable. Chad’s legal system is based on French civil law and Chadian customary law. The legal system’s highest jurisdictions, the Supreme Court and the Constitutional Council, have fully become operational since 2000. The National Assembly is made up of 155 members elected for a four-year term.

Multi-party democracy emerged in Chadian politics in 1992. Before then, the ruling MPS was the sole legal party. Over seventy eight registered political parties are now in existence. The country faced armed opposition from certain groups in the East of the country for quite some time. These forces invaded the capital on April 13, 2006 but were ultimately repelled. The government of President Idriss Deby Itno has gone the extra mile to maintain cohesion and economic stability. According to the United Nations, Chad has been affected by a humanitarian crisis since 2001. As of 2008, the country hosted 280.000 refugees from Sudan’s Darfur region, over 55.000 from the Central African Republic as well as 170.000 internally displaced persons. The hospitality of the Chadian government and people has made it easy for the international community to manage the huge influx of refugees from Sudan and the Central African Republic. Since February 2008, Chad has been divided into twenty two regions. Each region is headed by a governor. Prefects administer the sixty one departments within the regions. The departments are divided into 200 sub-prefectures, composed of 446 cantons.

Chad is the world’s twenty-first largest country. N’Djamena is the axis around which all political and economic activities revolve. Other major towns growing rapidly and joining the capital as decisive factors in economic growth include Sarh, Moundou, Abeche and Doba. Before the development of the oil industry, the cotton industry accounted for about 80% of export earnings. Exxon Mobil leads a consortium of Chevron and Petronas that is said to have invested close to four billion dollars to develop oil reserves estimated at one billion barrels in Southern Chad. Oil production began in 2003 with the completion of a pipeline that links these oil fields to terminals on the Atlantic coast of Cameroon. The pipeline has emerged as the most visible physical expression of the umbilical link between Cameroon and Chad. Relations between the two countries have grown from strength to strength since independence in 1960. Under President Paul Biya and Idriss Derby Itno, the two countries have witnessed a quantum leap in political, economic and social ties. The twin cities of Kousseri and N’Djamena have long been the staging post of good neighbourliness and mutual respect between two nations. The Lake Chad Basin is another common heritage shared by the two countries alongside Nigeria and Niger. After fifty years of independence, Chad and Cameroon are forging ahead in building lasting and mutually beneficial political and economic ties.

Emmanuel TATAW