A UN official has warned that Chad could become a " Sopranos-style free for all" when UN troops leave the country later this year.
Speaking on condition of anonymity, he said the decision by the United Nations Security Council to withdraw the 4,375-strong UN peacekeeping force, including members of the Irish Defence Forces, could lead to a bidding war for protection duties between local Chadian commanders.
Given that the various forces have more loyalty to their commanders than to the state, the region could again be plunged into anarchy as bands of commercially minded military commanders seek to make as much as possible.
“They are already charging 5,000 CFA (€8) a day plus food and fuel,” he says. If Minurcat (UN Mission in the Central African Republic and Chad) leave, government forces could become more interested in bidding for this work than protecting vulnerable civilians.
Doubts persist over the capability of Chadian government forces to protect vulnerable civilians living in camps in the east of the country. Desertification is forcing more people south, putting pressure on existing humanitarian hubs.
UN peacekeepers were deployed in 2009 to protect hundreds of thousands of displaced Chadians and refugees from the Sudanese province of Darfur.
However, following this week’s decision by the security council, a Chadian-run police force, the Détachement Intégré de Sécurité (DIS), will assume full responsibility for protecting refugees and the internally displaced in the country.
Amnesty International has warned that the move could leave large numbers of “vulnerable” people at risk but UN secretary general Ban Ki moon welcomed it, saying “the Chadian government assumes full responsibility for protecting civilians under international norms”.
The move, adopted unanimously by resolution at the security council, will initially cut the military component of Minurcat from 3,300 to 2,200 troops (1,900 in Chad and 300 in the Central African Republic), with the aim being to hand over responsibility for people in camps to the Chad government and DIS.
However, according to several analysts, the DIS is so poorly equipped that it will be unable to provide protection to the 250,000 refugees and 180,000 internally displaced people in the country. Vehicles donated to the forces lie idle in military camps because there are not enough qualified drivers to operate them, while police officers charged with protecting civilians in camps are trained in just eight weeks.
In a presentation before the security council this month, Chad’s defence chief Gen Dagache said Chad now had the capacity to provide its sovereign responsibility in the area of security and the protection of civilians.
But doubts persist, a situation which is not helped by the fact that a lack of oversight at Minurcat has meant that the DIS has received more credit than it is due.
A report by the UN secretary general last month stated that the DIS is supposed to have conducted 5,194 day and night patrols around refugee camps between November 2009 and March 21st, 2010.
However, according to sources within the UN, given the strength and number of serviceable vehicles available to the DIS, this figure is nowhere near possible. According to the UN sources, any attempt to investigate the accuracy of the figures in the secretary general’s report were frustrated.
Responding to concerns that the DIS was incapable of providing security, John Holmes, under-secretary-general for Humanitarian Affairs, admitted that the Chadian state had severe limits. “There are a lot of people running around with guns. It is an easy way of making a living and humanitarians are often the targets.”
In an interview with The Irish Times in the capital N’djamena on Tuesday, he said that despite the limits, what was important now was that the Chadian security services were seen to work.
While he would have preferred that Minurcat and Irish forces stayed “it is clear now that they will have to withdraw. So it is very important that countries direct their efforts to helping the Chadian security services become as effective as possible”.