/ 5 March 2010

Chad gets new prime minister

A former oil minister in Chad, Emmanuel Nadingar, was named prime minister on Friday after Youssouf Saleh Abbas tendered his resignation to the president, a presidential statement said.

After holding the strategic oil portfolio, Nadingar was minister for decentralisation in the government headed by Saleh Abbas, who took office in May 2008.

Nadingar comes from Bebidja in the south-west of the Central African country.

The speed of Nadingar’s appointment was a surprise, though several observers said that they had been expecting Saleh Abbas’s resignation for several weeks, in the absence of government activity.

No Cabinet meetings have been held since December and political differences became apparent between President Idriss Déby Itno and his prime minister, a former opposition figure.

Several ministers in Saleh Abbas’s government have been accused of embezzlement in a scandal related to the purchase of school textbooks.

State television reported that Saleh Abbas had tendered his resignation and that Déby had accepted it in a brief report that gave no reason why the prime minister stepped down. — AFP