Chad prevented a “destabilization attempt” by preventing gunfire from unknown assailants near the presidential palace in N’djamena.
He said
“I’m here at the presidential palace and as you can see there’s absolutely nothing, everything is calm,” government spokesman Abderaman Koulamallah said late Wednesday in a video that showed him surrounded by soldiers posted on his Facebook page. “We’re mobilized to defend our country and the president,”.
Gunfire was heard in N’Djamena around 8:00 p.m. on Wednesday, and it wasn’t immediately clear what sparked the shooting that lasted for about an hour. The public prosecutor will provide further information, Koulamallah said.
The bodies of multiple individuals were seen on the ground inside what appeared to be the presidential palace in unverified videos that were circulated on WhatsApp. In reference to Koulamallah, Agence France-Presse reported that 19 people had perished and multiple more were hurt.
The event occurred two weeks after the main opposition boycotted Chad’s parliamentary elections.
By January 15, preliminary results from the poll that followed last year’s presidential elections, in which Mahamat Déby, the military commander of Chad, formally established his authority following a 2021 power grab, are anticipated.
The central African nation, a long-term partner to the West in the fight against Islamist insurgents in the Sahel, ended a security agreement with former colonial power France in November, curbing Western military presence in the region.
Insurgents have been launching attacks in the country’s Lake Chad region, which borders Nigeria. Foreign Concerns China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi on a four-country tour in Africa met with Déby in N’djamena on Wednesday.
Sudan has said Chad is allowing the United Arab Emirates to provide support to the Rapid Support Forces, a Sudan paramilitary group, from an air base near its eastern border with Sudan. The claims have been confirmed by UN investigators.
