Chad’s President Idriss Déby has been killed in clashes with rebels in the north of the country at the weekend.
This was announced on state TV by the army.
Provisional results from the election on 11 April indicated that the late president was going to win a sixth term in office, with 80 percent of the vote.
With his demise, the government has been dissolved and a military council will govern the country for the next 18 months.
The council will be led by the late president’s son, Mahamat Idriss Déby Itno, 37, a four-star general.
A statement released by an army general and read out on state TV, said Mr Déby “breathed his last defending the sovereign nation on the battlefield”.
The late president had gone to the front line at the weekend to visit troops battling rebels based across the border in Libya.
Chad has fought a bitter battle with rebels from a group while calls itself ‘Fact’ (the Front for Change and Concord in Chad). The group attacked a border post on election day. They were advancing on the capital, N’Djamena, several hundred kilometres to the south.
There were heavy clashes on Saturday in which about 300 insurgents were reportedly killed and 150 captured.
Five government soldiers were reported killed during the clashes and 36 were injured.
Mr Déby enjoyed a long time cordial relationship with France and other Western powers in the battle against jihadist groups in the Sahel region of Africa.
