Chad Country Profile
Chad is a landlocked country in north-central Africa, with several varied geographical regions, including deserts and fertile savanna. Lake Chad is the second largest wetland in Africa, but diminishing with climate change. Chad’s official languages are Arabic and French, but home to over 200 different ethnic and linguistic groups. The most popular religion of Chad is Islam, followed by Christianity.
Why are people fleeing Chad for safety in other countries?
Since its independence from France in 1960, Chad has been swamped by the civil war between the Arab-Muslims of the north and the Sub-Saharan-Christians of the south. As a result, leadership and presidency in Chad drifted back and forth between the Christian southerners and Muslim northerners. When one side was in power, the other side usually started a revolutionary war to counter it. Conflict was further fuelled by the conflict in neighbouring Darfur (Sudan) leaking across the border, with refugees escaping Sudan and joining Chadian civilians in refugee camps, and Chad’s rebels receiving weapons and assistance from the Government of Sudan, while Sudan’s rebels got help from Chad’s Government.
In 2018 Amnesty International reported that ‘the armed group Boko Haram continued to commit abuses around Lake Chad. Chadian authorities repeatedly banned peaceful assemblies and arrested and prosecuted human rights defenders, activists and journalists, some of whom became prisoners of conscience. The right to freedom of association was violated with unlawful restrictions on the right to organize freely, including the criminalization of certain citizens’ associations. More than 408,000 refugees continued to live in dire conditions in camps including in Baga Sola.’