Chad military names Albert Padacke as head of transitional government

Albert Pahimi Padacké

Albert Pahimi Padacké, the last Prime Minister of Idriss Déby Itno, speaks during an interview in N'Djamena on April 26, 2021. 

Photo credit: Issouf Sanogo | AFP

Yaounde

Chad’s military has named the country’s former Prime Minister Albert Pahimi Padacke as head of the transitional government.

Mahamat Idriss Deby, head of the Transitional Military Council, announced the appointment in a decree signed on Monday.

Mr Padacke, who was the Sahel country’s Prime Minister from 2016-2018, is president of the opposition National Rally for Democracy in Chad (RNDP-Le Réveil).

He came second in the country’s April 11 presidential vote in which the late president Idriss Deby Itno was re-elected for a sixth term with 79.3 per cent. The former PM garnered 10.32 per cent of the vote that was boycotted by the country's top opposition leaders.

A military council has been controlling the country since President Deby died of injuries sustained in a frontline battle against the rebel Libya-based rebel group, Front for Change and Concord in Chad (FACT) a week ago. He was 68 and had ruled the country for three decades.

The African Union has expressed deep concern over the increasing spate of violence, insurrection and rebellion and the attendant heightened insecurity and political tensions throughout the Sahel region, as well as the neighbouring countries, “all of which are consequences of the conflict in Libya, the increasing operational tempo of rebels, foreign terrorist fighters and mercenaries, as well as the proliferation of illicit weapons.”