Chad
Chad exhibits low-range performance across all four categories in the Global State of Democracy’s framework, with factor scores predominantly in the bottom 25 per cent globally. Compared to 2019, Chad has experienced declines in Elected Government and Judicial Independence. Oil production accounts for roughly 70 per cent of all exports and 15 per cent of the GDP. The country struggles with a high poverty rate and food insecurity, both of which have been compounded by extensive flooding, climate change-driven desertification, and internal instability. Due to regional instability, Chad hosts almost two million refugees.
Once part of the Kanem-Bornu Empire, Chad endured violent French colonial rule between 1900 and 1960. At independence, it inherited a weak state, hobbled by limited infrastructure, arbitrary borders and a fragmented administrative system designed to foment ethnic competition. The pattern of authoritarianism and instability that has characterised Chad’s governance since independence was set by the country’s first president, François Tombalbaye, whose rule was marked by political repression, regionally-based patronage, and armed conflict.
Since 1990, the country has been ruled by the Déby family through the Patriotic Salvation Movement, with former President Idriss Déby having seized power that year via a coup d’état. Lacking the state capacity to deliver basic services and exert territorial control, it has maintained power largely by repressing dissent and balancing and co-opting local power brokers. Chad’s chronic instability and fragility has helped make the military a highly influential actor and its importance has grown in recent years as the government battles insurgencies in the west (Boko Haram), and rebel groups along its northern and eastern borders.
Chad is currently emerging from a political transition to civilian rule, after several years of an interim military government headed by the recently elected President, Mahamat Déby, and installed following the death of his father in 2021. While during the early stages of the transition Mahamat Déby signalled an openness to democratic reform, subsequent developments have reinforced authoritarian patterns. Under the recently ratified constitution, political power remains highly centralised and the 2024-2025 transitional elections were marred by political violence, media restrictions, and allegations of fraud.
Religious, ethnic and regional identities are highly salient in Chad where, since the late 1970s, the political elite have come from the Arab Muslim north, fuelling resentment within communities in the Christian and animist south, which demand greater representation. There is also broader discontentment over the political, economic, and military dominance of the Déby family’s Zaghawa ethnic group during their rule. Additionally, these identities have been an important driver of the deadly intercommunal violence between sedentary farmers and cattle herders competing over scarce resources.
Chad is among the world’s bottom 25 per cent of countries with regard to Gender Equality, despite constitutional protections. It has among the world’s highest rates of child marriage, and female genital mutilation is widely practiced. Same-sex activity is criminalised, and the wider LGBTQIA+ community are severely stigmatized.
Looking ahead, Rights will be an important area to monitor in light of the growing restrictions on political space, including the detention of political opponents and journalists. Rights and Rule of Law should be similarly monitored in the near-term for the potentially destabilizing impacts of the war in neighbouring Sudan. The resource strain emanating from the influx of Sudanese refugees, for example, has exacerbated intercommunal tensions in the border regions.
Last updated: July 2025
https://www.idea.int/democracytracker/
August 2025
Opposition leader Succès Masra receives 20-year prison sentence
On 9 August, the High Court of N’Djamena sentenced opposition leader and former Prime Minister Succès Masra to 20 years in prison, following his conviction for complicity in murder and disseminating hateful and xenophobic messages in proceedings widely perceived to be politically motivated. The convictions relate to deadly intercommunal violence that took place in southwest Chad in May 2025, which prosecutors alleged was triggered by an audio recording of Masra calling for farmers to arm themselves against herder communities. Masra, who denies all the charges against him, says the recording was from 2023 and that he had simply called on the farmers to form self-defence groups. His lawyers criticised the state for a lack of evidence against their client and commentators also raised due process concerns. Masra was tried alongside the perpetrators of the violence and in addition to custodial sentences, they were collectively fined CFA francs 1 billion (approximately US$1.8 million).
Sources: Jeune Afrique, Deutsche Welle, The Conversation, Human Rights Watch, International IDEA
May 2025
Chad detains opposition leader Succès Masra
On 16 May, Chadian authorities arrested the leader of the opposition Transformers (Les Transformateurs) party and former Prime Minister, Succès Masra, as part of an investigation into recent intercommunal violence between farming and herding communities in the southwest of the country. Prosecutors alleged that the violence was triggered by an audio recording of Masra urging farmers in the affected village to arm themselves and he was charged with incitement to hatred and revolt, complicity in murder and the desecration of graves. On 21 May, he was placed in pre-trial detention. Masra denies the charges against him, saying the recording is two years old and that in it he had simply called on the farmers to form self-defence groups. The opposition leader is a fierce critic of President Mahamat Idriss Déby Itno and his lawyers and party allege the prosecution is politically motivated. His arrest followed a resumption of his opposition activities in the country’s capital, N'Djamena.
Sources: Reuters, International Crisis Group, Jeune Afrique (1), Jeune Afrique (2)
March 2025
Journalists detained over ‘collusion’ with Wagner
Three journalists in Chad were arrested and detained in March on charges of working with the Russian paramilitary group Wagner and reportedly face up to 30 years in prison. The prosecutor’s office said the three journalists, who work for different media outlets, had provided Russia with information about Chad that was likely to harm the country’s military and economic interests. News reports suggested that the arrest of one of the journalists, Olivier Mbaindinguim Monodji, may be connected to an article he wrote on the inauguration of a Russian cultural institute in Chad’s capital, N’Djamena, and that another, Mahamat Saleh Alhissein, has been accused of translating Russian files on the economic and security situation in the Sahel. The Union of Chadian Journalists (L'Union des Journalistes Tchadiens, UJT) and other rights organisations criticised the detentions as arbitrary.
Sources: Jeune Afrique, Agence France-Presse, International Federation of Journalists, The Africa Report
February 2025
Ruling party wins first senatorial elections
Chad held indirect Senatorial elections on 25 February, which were the first in its history and were won by President Mahamat Déby’s ruling party, the Patriotic Salvation Movement (Mouvement Patriotique du Salut, MPS). According to official results, MPS secured 43 of the 46 elected seats in the Senate, the remaining three seats were won by the National Rally of Chadian Democrats (Rassemblement national des démocrates Tchadiens - le Réveil, RNDT–Le Réveil) (two seats) and the Union for Renewal and Democracy (Union pour le renouveau et la démocratie, URD) (one seat), respectively. Several opposition parties boycotted the election, claiming that it would not be credible. The senators were elected by an electoral college of municipal and provincial counsellors. A further 23 senators were appointed by President Déby on 4 March, most of which came from MPS. Twenty five of the 69 senators (36.2 per cent) are women, in conformity with a gender quota target of 30 per cent. Chad’s new bicameral parliament was established by a 2020 constitutional reform and later confirmed by the 2023 constitution. The elections formally end the country’s transition to democracy that began after the 2021 unconstitutional change of government that first brought Déby to power. He was subsequently elected President in May 2024.
Sources: Radio France Internationale, Associated Press News, Agence Presse Africaine, International IDEA, Africa 24, Electoral Institute for Sustainable Democracy in Africa, Barron's
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