The Attorney General of N’Djamena, Mahamat El-Hadj Abba Nana, announced on Tuesday, March 21, the sentencing to life imprisonment of more than 400 members of the rebel movement “Front pour l’alternance et la concorde du Tchad” ( FACT), for “act of terrorism, mercenarism, enlistment of children in the army and attack on the life of the Head of State” of former President Idriss Déby Itno.
They should pay 30 million euros to the Chadian State, for damages and 1.5 million euros to the heirs of the late Chadian President Idriss Deby Itno.
FACT leader Mahamat Mahdi Ali is among those convicted. Exiled abroad, he was tried in absentia. On the other hand, 24 people were acquitted at the end of the trial, according to the same source.
Marshal Déby, who had ruled his country with an iron fist for more than 30 years, had died in clashes between the army and FACT militants. According to the power, he had been killed in his convoy by heavy machine gun fire while he was going to the front. Several rebels were then captured and taken prisoner.
Mahamat Mahdi Ali said that “this verdict is a non-event”. It is, according to him, “a masquerade that obeys no law, no convention”. The leader of FACT considered that “all this stems from a desire to want to criminalize” their “struggle”. The defense of the detainees plans to appeal in cassation for all the convictions.
It should be noted that this trial, which was publicly announced a few days before its opening, to everyone’s surprise, and which was held behind closed doors within the walls of the Klessoum prison, about twenty kilometers to the south-east of N’Djamena, the Chadian capital, caused human rights organizations to react.
By OMA Newsletter N° 1097 of 21/03/2023
Article published under the direction of Dr. Najib Kettani
The OMA, NGO with an Intercontinental vocation
For the development of cultural exchanges
Valuing human potential
The promotion and consolidation of Africa’s development, and
Inter-African integration
