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Chad
GeographyA landlocked country in north-central Africa, Chad is about 85% the size of Alaska. Its neighbors are Niger, Libya, the Sudan, the Central African Republic, Cameroon, and Nigeria. Lake Chad, from which the country gets its name, lies on the western border with Niger and Nigeria. In the north is a desert that runs into the Sahara. GovernmentRepublic. HistoryThe area around Lake Chad has been inhabited since at least 500 B.C. In the 8th century A.D. Berbers began migrating to the area. Islam arrived in 1085, and by the 16th century a trio of rival kingdoms flourished: the Kanem-Bornu, Baguirmi, and Ouaddaï. In 1883–1893, all three kingdoms came under the rule of the Sudanese conqueror Rabih al-Zubayr. In 1900, Rabih was overthrown by the French, who absorbed these kingdoms into the colony of French Equatorial Africa, as part of Ubangi-Shari (now the Central African Republic), in 1913. In 1946, the territory, now known as Chad, became an autonomous republic within the French Community. An independence movement led by the first premier and president, François (later Ngarta) Tombalbaye, achieved complete independence on Aug. 11, 1960. Tombalbaye was killed in the 1975 coup and succeeded by Gen. Félix Malloum, who faced a Libyan-financed civil war throughout his tenure in office. In 1977, Libya seized a strip of Chadian land and launched an invasion two years later. Nine rival groups meeting in Lagos, Nigeria, in March 1979 agreed to form a provisional government headed by Goukouni Oueddei, a former rebel leader. Fighting broke out again in Chad in March 1980, when Defense Minister Hissen Habré challenged Goukouni and seized the capital. Libyan president Muammar al-Qaddafi, in Jan. 1981, proposed a merger of Chad with Libya. The Libyan proposal was rejected and Libyan troops withdrew from Chad that year, but in 1983 they poured back into the northern part of the country in support of Goukouni. France, in turn, sent troops into southern Chad in support of Habré. Government troops then launched an offensive in early 1987 that drove the Libyans out of most of the country. In 1990, Idriss Déby, a former defense minister and head of the Patriotic Salvation Movement, overthrew Habré, suspended the constitution, and dissolved the legislature. In 1994 a new constitution was drafted and an amnesty for political prisoners was declared. Déby won multiparty elections in 1996 and was reelected in 2001. His rule has been marked by repression and corruption. Déby has faced about a half-dozen insurgencies since taking office. In June 2000 the World Bank agreed to provide more than $200 million to build a $3.7-billion pipeline connecting the oil fields in Chad to those in Cameroon. Oil revenues are estimated to earn $2.5 billion over the next 30 years. Human rights groups are concerned they will only benefit the oil companies and the political elite in Cameroon and Chad. The World Bank, however, has forced Chad to agree to spend 80% of the resulting oil revenues on education, health, infrastructure, and other social welfare projects desperately needed by this impoverished country. The deal has been hailed as a novel approach to ensuring that developing countries with authoritarian governments manage to spend revenues to alleviate the poverty of their people rather than enrich its elite. (In 2005, Transparency International listed Chad as the world's most corrupt country.) In the next 25 years Chad is expected to make $80 million per year, increasing the government treasury by 50%. But in 2006, after the pipeline was completed, Déby reneged on the deal with the World Bank, saying he would spend the oil revenues to finance the military, to buttress his nearly insolvent government, and to shore up his fragile hold on power. In response, the World Bank suspended its loans and froze Chad's bank accounts. In May the World Bank and Chad reached a compromise: Chad's government would receive 30% of the oil revenues, instead of the 10% originally agreed to, and the remaining 70% of revenues would be spent exclusively on programs to alleviate the country's poverty. By 2006, about 250,000 Sudanese refugees had fled to Chad to escape the fighting in Sudan's Darfur region, where they face hunger and disease in desperately undersupplied refugee camps. In April 2006, a coup to oust Déby was averted with the help of French troops stationed in the country. Opposition parties boycotted the May presidential elections, and Déby retained the presidency. Prime Minister Pascal Yoadimnadji died in February 2007. President Déby named Delwa Kassire Koumakoye as his successor. Rebels from three groups stormed N'Djamena in February 2008 and demanded the resignation of President Déby. Chad's military, however, repulsed the rebels. Leaders in Chad accused Sudan of fomenting the rebellion, and tension between the two countries escalated. About 100 people died in the fighting. In April, Déby fired Prime Minister Delwa Kassire Koumakoye and replaced him with Youssouf Saleh Abbas. See also Encyclopedia: Chad. Information Please® Database, © 2008 Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.
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