Chad junta’s main opponents barred from presidential election

Authorities in Chad said on Sunday they had barred 10 candidates, including two fierce opponents of the military regime, from standing in the presidential election on May 6.

The constitutional court said the candidates’ applications – namely those of outspoken opponents Nassour Ibrahim Neguy Koursami and Rakhis Ahmat Saleh – had been rejected because they included “irregularities”.

Ten other candidates remain in the race – most prominently the current junta leader Mahamat Idriss Deby Itno and his prime minister Succes Masra.

General Deby Itno was proclaimed president by a junta of 15 generals in 2021 following the death of his father Idriss Deby Itno, who had ruled the Sahel country with an iron fist for more than three decades.

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Succes Masra, a former opposition leader, signed a reconciliation deal with the junta leader earlier this year.

The opposition says his candidacy is a ploy to give a veneer of pluralism to an election that Deby Itno is certain to win since his main rivals are dead or in exile.