Chad’s President Idriss Déby, 68, has passed away after suffering injuries during a visit to the frontlines of the country’s battle against rebels near the troubled Sahel region.
Déby’s death comes a day after he was re-elected for the sixth time, after provisional election results on Monday showed he had won with 79.3 per cent of votes.
Déby had been president since 1990, when he took power following the Chadian coup d'état that deposed Hissène Habré.
The national army of the country confirmed his death on national radio.
As per the military, the army had been pushed back by a column of insurgents who were advancing on the capital, N’Djamena. While Déby was expected to give a victory speech after his win, he chose instead to visit Chadian soldiers on the front lines, according to his campaign director Mahamat Zen Bada.
"The candidate would have liked to have been here to celebrate... but right now, he is alongside our valiant defence and security forces to fight the terrorists threatening our territory," Zen Bada told reporters, Reuters reported.
Déby's 37-year-old son, Mahamat Idriss Déby Itno, will replace him, the army said. Itno is a four-star general.
Army spokesperson General Azem Bermandao Agouna told reporters that Army troops killed over 300 insurgents and captured 150 on Saturday in the Kanem province, 300km from the capital. However, the rebel Front for Change and Concord in Chad (FACT) said it had routed the Chad army on Sunday, killing, wounding and capturing hundreds of soldiers.
Chad partners with four other African nations, Burkina Faso, Mali, Mauritania and Niger, as well as a host of Western powers led by France, in combating insurgency in the troubled Sahel region.
