How Does Chaos in Chad Risk Benefiting Jihadist Groups?

The Sahel region, a band stretching more than 5,000 kilometers across the middle of the African continent, is the region of the world most vulnerable to jihadist violence today. As well as seeing a growing number of attacks by extremist groups, it has witnessed no fewer than seven coups d’état during the last decade, along with a string of military campaigns against jihadist groups. These have however failed to rein in such organizations, which have rather morphed and escalated their operations since 2012, despite three French operations - Serval, Barkhane, and the Takuba Task Force – aimed at tackling them.

France has mainly deployed its forces in Mali, relying on a coalition of Sahel countries - Mali, Burkina Faso, Mauritania, Chad, and Niger – to battle jihadists. Yet despite some early successes, these operations ended in dismal failure, reflected in the displacement of more than 15 million people in the region, the growing influence of jihadist groups in Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso, and threats that Mali could break apart entirely, as the violence has strengthened separatist groups in the north of the country.

Domino Effect Reaches Chad

The Sahel consists of a belt of countries extending from Mauritania to Chad. France, which has deployed forces in several Sahel countries within the framework of the “Serval” and “Barkhane” operations, has been seeking to stabilize the political and security situation with the aim of maintaining its own economic, political and military influence there and preventing a resurgence of jihadist groups.

However, the region has seen repeated coups. One outlier is Mauritania, where the political and security situation appears stable and jihadist groups are not openly active. At the other end of the Sahel belt however, Chad is far more vulnerable to the infection of coups and jihadist violence. There is an acute risk that the most easterly of the Sahel countries will fall victim to the instability and chaos plaguing the rest of the region.

Since Chad’s independence in 1960, six presidents have ruled Chad. Two hailed from the Arab Qaraan tribe (Gokoni Ouaddai, who ruled from 1980-1982, and Hissène Habré, from 1982-1990). Habré was toppled in an armed rebellion led by Idriss Déby Itno who seized power in his place.

After taking power, Déby was able to place the Arab Zaghawa tribe in control of the state and the army, despite the fact it only made up less than two percent of the population. His regime excluded the Qaraan tribe, which makes up more than six percent of the total population of Chad, from all aspects of power. The same was true of the country’s many other ethnicities, such as the Sari, the Tebu, and the Bama. This gave rise to several major armed rebellions, including one led by Hassan Habré, who succeeded in bringing his forces to the capital in 2008, but French support for President Idriss Déby Itno forced him to retreat.

Déby’s son, Mohamed Idriss Déby, has taken power since the killing of his father in May 2021 in the war against opposition factions in the north. A military council was formed of 15 senior army officers, with Déby the son at its head, an appointment supported by France. The Chadian government committed to holding a national dialogue conference that would lead to the adoption of a new constitution and the democratic transfer of power.

However, following his father’s killing in May 2021, Déby junior’s regime imposed martial law, suspended the existing constitution, repressed pro-democracy demonstrations, and promoted a transitional timetable for a national dialogue to produce a new constitution and political reforms.

Concurrently, Chad transformed into a logistical and operational command hub for French operations in the Sahel. Between 2020 and 2023, France sent several forces adding up to some 1,500 troops, drawn from its contingent in the peacekeeping mission in Mali. It also made a major contribution to military operations in support of the Nigerian army in the Lake Chad area of northeastern Nigeria against the Islamic State group’s “West African Province”.

On December 25, 2023, the National Commission that organized the constitutional referendum on December 17 announced that 86% of votes cast had supported the new constitution, with 14% against, on a turnout just shy of 64%.

The new constitution did not incorporate the federalist amendments demanded by opposition parties. Rather, it focused on the unity of the country and rejection of centralization. It stipulated that the military junta would cede power to civilians through democratic elections, which will purportedly be held at the end of 2024. The Chadian opposition argues that the current constitution is no different from the previous one. Mohamed Idriss Déby, as head of the military council, can still run in the upcoming elections. It is telling that the minimum age for candidates to the presidency has been lowered from 40 to 35 years; Déby is 38.

A Perfect Storm of Instability?

Two factors are of particular note in the context of the regional and domestic unrest affecting Chad. The first is that the American ambassador in N’Djamena, Alexander Marc Laskaris, warned the country’s president in mid-January 2023 of an imminent coup attempt involving the Russian Wagner militia and the commander of the Rapid Support Forces in Sudan, Mohamed Hamdan Daglo, known as “Hemedti”. The RSF is currently engaged in a nation-wide conflict with the Sudanese army, and has used the Central African Republic and southern Libya as rear bases. However, Hemedti has a close personal relationship with Déby, who summoned the RSF commander for explanations shortly after his meeting with the American ambassador.

The second factor is the dissatisfaction of the elite of the Chadian army - most of which hails from the Zaghawa tribe - with the actions of the head of the military council, starting with his expulsion of the German ambassador for “impolite behavior” following the nationalization of the oil sector. Top officers are also irked by his attempt to use the Russian Wagner militia to lead campaigns against rebels in the north, due to its presence in Libya and its proximity to Hemedti, as well as his decision to hand the strategic Amdjarass Airport in the country’s east to the United Arab Emirates, for use as a regional air and military base. They also fret over his relationship with Hemedti, who is descended from mixed Sudanese-Chadian parents. This is seen as creating a risk that Hemedti causes chaos in the country and plunges it into a new period of violence in the context of a region already in turmoil.

Some senior army commanders, including Zaghawa generals, have even criticized Déby publicly, especially since he pushed several top commanders to retire and promoted his friends, such as Idris Yusuf Bouy, to sensitive positions. The army elite oppose several of his policies, such as his move to arm the RSF, fearing this could have repercussions for Chad itself, allowing Hemedti’s militia to wreak chaos there after tightening its control over western and central Sudan. These fears have been heightened by the group’s ethnic cleansing campaigns against the Masalit minority in Western Darfur, with whom top Chadian army officers are tied through relations of intermarriage and deep-rooted cultural ties. Thus, they see Déby’s actions as a direct threat to themselves.

All of this increases the possibility of a repeat of the August 2023 coup in Gabon. In Chad, such a scenario could see palace officers, or one of Déby’s brothers, launch a coup that would change the political map of the country. Thus, the real threat to the head of the Chadian Military Council comes not from the opposition parties or the ballot box, but rather from the military circle close to him. Speculation is raging that the country is on the verge of a military coup by the inner army leadership. Such a scenario would fuel the chaos that could threaten France’s last base in the Sahel after its exit from Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger.

A Land of Opportunities for Jihadist Groups

More than half a million Sudanese refugees have arrived in Chad, making the country one of the top destinations for civilians fleeing the RSF. In addition, growing anger against France is leading to growing calls for it to leave Chad, its last military outpost in the Sahel. There are also warning signs of a famine, in a region that has seen acute drought in recent years. This raises the prospect of a humanitarian catastrophe that the World Food Programme (WFP) would struggle to tackle, given its weak reach in the country and the lack of support for its activities in the region.

Chad has a population of around 18 million people, some three-quarters of whom live in rural areas. Its youthful population makes it a rich potential target for jihadist recruitment. This situation offers great opportunities for both IS, which has a presence in large areas of the Lake Chad region straddling the border between Nigeria and Chad as well as north of the capital, N'Djamena, and for Al-Qaeda, which may exploit the country’s chaos to establish a foothold in Chad with the support of the Al-Shabaab group in Somalia, or the Nusrat al-Islam wa-l-Muslimin group in the Sahel Triangle.

Were Chad to fall into chaos or civil war, this would also fuel a thriving illicit arms trade and allow an influx of tens of thousands of fighters from Sudan, Nigeria, Libya, and the Horn of Africa, potentially sparking a huge escalation of the chaos and violence already affecting the Sahel region.