The Chadian constitution of 1996 () was the supreme law of Chad from its adoption until 2018.Current Constitution of Chad The country's seventh constitution, it was adopted six years after President Idriss Déby rose to power following a successful rebellion against President Hissène Habré.
The 1996 constitution established the framework of the Chadian state and government and enumerated the rights and freedoms of its citizens. In its final form it included a preamble, 16 parts and 225 articles, having originally been composed of 15 parts and 239 articles.1996 Constitution of Chad The constitution was controversially amended in 2005 amid fraud allegations, with the term limits for the presidency eliminated. It was replaced by a new text in 2018.
Previous constitutions Before the 1996 constitution was approved, Chad had already been subjected between 1959 and 1990 to eight constitutions. The first constitution was approved on March 31, 1959, when the country was still a French colony. The constitution originated a parliamentary system, with executive powers exercised for a five-years' term by a Prime Minister, subject to the confirmation of the National Assembly. This constitution was early replaced on November 28, 1960, when the country had just achieved independence, with a new one that introduced a semi-presidential system. President François Tombalbaye replaced that constitution on April 16, 1962, with a third constitution that provided for a fully presidential system. Under this constitution, the president was elected for a seven-years' term by a restricted electoral college, composed by National Assembly deputies, mayors, municipal councillors and chiefs. The new constitution also ushered the way to the one party-system by restricting election to the assembly through a single electoral list. The passage to one-party rule was later officialized through the constitutional law of December 29, 1965, amending the 1962 constitution. Eventually Tombalbaye opted for a new constitution in November 1973, on the wave of the cultural revolution and the demise of the Chadian Progressive Party in favour of the National Movement for the Cultural and Social Revolution, so that the new constitutional text would enshrine the regime's ideology.
Following the fall of Tombalbaye in 1975 and the accord between President Félix Malloum and the insurgent leader Hissène Habré in 1978, a new constitution was created on August 29, 1978, to make space for a coalition government, with the executive power shared between the President and the Prime Minister. As part of the coalition accord a National Council representative of all prefectures was set up, and also a Defence and Security Council in which Malloum and Habré partisans were given equal representation.
Another constitutional text to follow was the short-lived Declaration of N'Djamena, an interim-document originated on May 8, 1982, after long negotiatiations among the factions that composed the Transitional Government of National Unity. The declaration provided for an executive president, Goukouni Oueddei, and a 15-men policy-making organ in which all factions were by law to be represented. Members of the council could not stand in the cabinet, which awnsered to Goukouni and was headed by Prime Minister Djidingar Dono Ngardoum. After less than a month the declaration was already defunct, when Habré's forces conquered the capital on June 7. Once arrived to power, Habré engineered on September 29 a constitution in line with his needs and that of his faction, the Armed Forces of the North (FAN). The constitution provided for a powerful President that was both head of state and of government, put in its place by the FAN's political bureau. In case of high treason, the President was accountable for his acts before an ad hoc created FAN high court. A 30-strong members National Consultative Council was also projected, whose members were to come from all of Chad's prefectures and were appointed and dismissed by the President.
After Habré defeated Libya in the Toyota War, considerable French pressure was put on Chad to start a democratisation process and to proceed towards national reconciliation. As an answer to these pressures Habré's government produced in June 1989 a constitutional draft that was to establish a strong president elected for a seven-year term and reintroduced the National Assembly, always in the frame of a one-party system. With an official but improbable turnout of 99.4% a popular referendum sanctioned the constitution's approval with a 92% of "yes" votes. Such a referendum could hardly legitimate the regime, and gave little hope of progress towards a true national reconciliation.S. Nolutshungu, Limits of Anarchy, 236
Constitutional process The day after rising to power on December 2, 1990, Idriss Déby suspended the 1989 constitution. This was replaced on March 1, 1991, by a transitional national charter, after having been adopted on February 28 by the National Salvation Council, that it was announced would be replaced in 30 months by a new constitution drawn up by a Sovereign National Conference.S. Nolutshungu, Limits of Anarchy, 253 The Charter, while if it gave vast if not exorbitant powers to the presidency, assured fundamental freedoms and rights, including the freedom of opinion and of association, the freedom of the press, the free movement of persons and property, the right to own property and the individual and collective freedoms in the frame of a pluralist democracy.UNHCR The Charter also prohibited magistrates, men of the military and security services from being members of any party. The Charter also attempted to avoid a return of warlordism and sectarian politics, that had long plagued Chad: article 5 demanded parties "to shun intolerance, tribalism, regionalism, religious discrimination and xenophobia and incitement to hatred, and the resource [to] violence in all its forms", while article 6 forbade parties "to set up military or paramilitary organizations; to reconstitute into political parties any erstwhile politico-military bodies". To weaken tribalism, it was also added that to register, parties would need at least three members taken from each of ten prefectures. Despite this, the charter was widely seen of an attempt by a government only reluctantly committed to democracy to strictly remain in control of every part of the democratisation process.S. Nolutshungu, 253–254
In December 1991, with considerable delay and due to both serious armed challenges to Déby rule and French pressure, a 79-member commission was instituted to prepare the ground for the conference that, originally scheduled to be convened in May 1992, was on the occasion postponed. Following a month of discussions, the commission articulated a plan for the conference and its composition.S. Nolutshungu, 254 Another commission followed in November 1992, known as the Tripartite Commission, composed of representatives of political parties, the government and civil society, under the chairmanship of the Interior Minister. The Commission appointed the 830 delegates to be represented at the CNS from a cross-section of Chad's society. The conference, which opened on January 15, 1993, obtained sovereign powers, and was encharged to prepare a draft of the constitution in one month.
The national conference, which remained in charge until April 6, when it selected in its place a Conseil Supérieur de Transition (CST), a 57-strong body transitional parliament, and a transitional government, both of which were designed to remain in charge for a year, i.e. until April 6, 1994, by which term elections were to take place and a definitive constitution be approved. In the meanwhile the conference adopted the National Charter as an interim constitution. As little had been achieved during the first year of transition, the term was later extended by the CST to April 9, 1995."Background Note: Chad". 1995. United States Department of State This period was further extended by the CST on March 31, 1995, with the date for the approval by referendum of the constitution scheduled for March 31, 1996.Guy Arnold, Britannica Book of the Year
Finally, after more than three years of transition, the referendum was held as scheduled in 1996, proposing a draft modelled on the French constitution, promoting a presidential and unitary state. The proposed draft, mostly conceived among the presidential entourage and Déby's French allies, was approved by the 61.4% of the voters, but met with strong opposition in southern Chad: in four prefectures the constitution was rejected with over 80% of the votes, confirming the existence of deep divisions in Chad between the Muslim North and the Christian and animist South. Among the motivations adduced by the supporters of the "No" vote were that it did not create an independent judiciary, that it concentrated too much power in the presidency, and that it established Arabic as an official language.
1996 constitution
Preamble The Constitution begins with a preamble, that severely criticizes the Chadian past, arguing that "years of dictatorship and single party rule have prevented the blossoming of any democratic culture and of multi-party politics", and has favoured the diffusion of "tribalism" and violations of human rights, thus generating "war, political violence, hatred, intolerance and suspicion between the different communities that make up the Chadian nation." To put an end to the "institutional and political crisis which has been shaking Chad for more than three decades", the preamble states that the Chadian people are committed "to build a state of law and a united nation founded on public liberties and fundamental human rights, dignity of the human person, and political pluralism, on the African values of solidarity and brotherhood", and also to seek to reach the goal of African unity. In the preamble the right of revolution is provided for: the individuals have not only the right, but also the duty to oppose "any state body that would assume power by force or would exercise it in violation of the present Constitution".
The constitution also vows to respect the human rights, defining the latter by its endorsement of the Charter of the United Nations, the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The constitutional endorsement of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights is an aspect Chad has in common with many national constitutions: among African countries, it is endorsed by Benin, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cameroon, Cape Verde, Comoros, Congo-Brazzaville, Côte d'Ivoire, Equatorial Guinea, Ethiopia, Gabon, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Rwanda, Senegal and Tanzania.Kamarei, Ahmad Reza (2005); Constitutional Provisions Referring to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights A problem is represented by the implementation of the human rights norms, as there is a legal vacuum due to the lack of the necessary provisions in the Criminal Code, which has to be amended so that national legislation is put into line with the international human rights instruments."Chad". Human Rights Instruments. United Nations Commission on Human Rights. December 12, 1997.
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