Volume 3, issue #5 - 10-02-1998

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Chad president promises oil wealth will benefit whole country

Jan. 2, 1998 Chad's president pledged in a New Year message that wealth from new reserves of oil, expected to come on stream early in the next century, will benefit the whole country and not just a select few.
Idriss Deby said in a broadcast address that Chad had been waiting three decades to benefit from its oil, and expressed regret that the issue had become politicised with critics saying only his regime and one category of citizens would benefit.
"The revenue from oil will benefit all Chadians. I personally guarantee that,'' he told state radio and television.
"The oil belongs to all. As such, the resources that come from it will boost the state's investment capacity in education, health, agriculture, livestock rearing, infrastructure,'' he added. "The government has been working for a year to put in place the best strategy for the resources from oil. The basic choice has been made and oil resources will be used above all to fight poverty,'' he said.
Deby, a former guerrilla commander from the Moslem north, took power in a French-backed coup in 1990. Western oil companies have discovered oil reserves in the mainly Christian south of the country.
The plan is to export the oil through a pipeline to Cameroon which has yet to be built.
Deby called for national unity and expressed his condolences to victims of bloody clashes between the army and former rebels in October in Chad's second city of Moundou, in the southern oil zone. The official death toll was 42 but human rights groups say the army killed a further 52 people - all civilians.
Deby, who won 1996 presidential elections, said he aimed to clean up public finances and continue with privatisation and structural economic reforms started with donors in 1992.
Parliament has adopted a deficit budget for 1998 incorporating a new tax on all goods and services. Officials said the 5 % tax would touch all sectors of commercial and economic life. It was to take effect on New Year's Day.
Tuesday's vote was the first of its kind since independence from France in 1960. Deby's ruling Patriotic Salvation Movement has 66 of the 125 seats in parliament after winning 1997 elections.
The budget envisages spending of over 130 bn CFA francs ($ 218 mm) and receipts of over 118 bn CFA. The government says it expects the deficit, which will top 11 bn CFA, to be funded with help from donors.
Officials said that senior civil servants would get fewer allowances, promotions would carry no pay increase and no new civil servants would be taken on.
The government said during the budget debate that inflation was currently between 10 and 15 percent. ($ 1 - 596 CFA francs)