9 April 2021By AFP
2 min 2Approximate reading time
As veteran leader Idriss Deby Itno goes for a sixth term in Chad’s presidential vote on Sunday, we look back on the key events of his 30 years at the helm of the huge mostly desert African state.
– 1990: Seizes the capital –
Former army chief turned rebel leader, Deby seizes power in December 1990 when his troops enter the capital N’Djamena and send dictator Hissene Habre fleeing into exile in Senegal.
After six years of transition towards democracy, he is elected president in 1996 in Chad’s first multi-party election, bringing some of the political opposition into government.