For the time being, the 37 year-old has the backing of former colonial power France.

President Emmanuel Macron went to N’Djamena for Friday’s funeral of Mahamat’s 68-year-old father who died at the hands of rebels a day after winning his sixth term as President of the troubled, largely desert country.

Constitutionally, Chad’s parliamentary speaker should have taken power and moved to elections within 18 months.

But the constitution and parliament have both been scrapped by the military council that put the son at the helm.

The country’s borders have been closed and a night time curfew is being enforced

France’s decision to back this move “for reasons of security following extraordinary events” puts its at odds with the international community.

The African Union, which is bound by its basic law to red card any unconstitutional change in government, has called on Mahamat to restore the country to legality.

Chad’s opposition has called the new power structure a “dynastic coup” and its trade unions are calling for a general strike until the constitution is restored.

There is an uneasy calm in Chad following the move that has played into the hands of the rebel Front for Change and Concord in Chad (FACT).

Mahamat realises this. He has made frequent appeals over national radio for peace and insisted that he open to dialogue.

The opposition will not take up this offer while he claims to be president.

France’s support comes because of Chad’s pivotal role in the fight against jihadis in the Sahel – that strip of land between the Sahara and the North African coastal states.

Idriss Deby was an inveterate supporter of the group of five Sahel states.

These include Burkina Faso, Mauritania, Niger and Mali.

In N’Djamena on Friday, Macron impressed on their leaders present the need to stand united against militant Islam threatening all their countries.

Will they heed the call from their former colonial power, who provides Chad with intelligence and security?

Or will they fall into line with the African Union that is bound to exclude Chad from the continental body’s deliberations until the constitution is restored?

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Not surprisingly France’s President Emmanuel Macron was among the first world leaders to congratulate Joe Biden on winning the US Presidency.

Paris and Washington have a crowded schedule of business, starting with Biden bringing the United State back into the climate change agreement signed  in the French capital four years ago.

Biden will be an extremely welcome participant at the climate summit in Scotland.

France continues to control the file on this make-or-break issue for the world.

Running close behind welcoming America’s more prominent green agenda , France is looking for increased US support for the initiative to fight Islamist jihadis in the that strip of land between North Africa and the Sahara Desert known as the Sahel.

President Donald Trump has effectively told Macron that this French-led initiative is to Paris’ account.

Washington’s has given $8,5 million to Chad to help it counter ISIS terrorism.

This pales next to the boots on the ground and cash contributed to the G5 comprising Chad, Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger and Mauritania.

The group was set up in 2014 when Mauritania held the AU presidency.

It has been underpinned by two resolution of the United Nations Security Council.

The world organization has committed 10 000 troops to its anti terror group in the region known as MINUSMA.

France has put its muscle where its mouth is with 3 000 troops from Operation Barkhane .

France stepped into drive out the Islamists who took advantage of a 2012  coup in Mali.

Things have become vary complicated since then and France could do with help form a fellow permanent Western member of the UN powerhouse.

Ibrahim Boubakar Keita, installed in 2012, was unseated in another coup last August which led to Bah Ndaw becoming become the interim president.

Further confusing things, Amadou Toumani Tourè, who led Mali for a decade during which he introduced democratic reforms before he deposed in the 2012 putsch, died in Turkey this week.

It will be impressed on Biden that Germany has provided 900 troops to the Sahel operation and the European Union  has chipped in 50million euros.

Even the cash-strapped African Union has contributed $3 million.

The world is waiting on the new administration in Washington.

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France’s Armed Forces Minister Florence Parly will go to Washington this week to secure continued US support for the fight against Islamist extremists in the Sahel.

Ends intro

Jihadis have used northern Mali to mount a series of attacks on that country and neighbouring Burkina Faso and Niger.

The US has supplied drone support, logistics, intelligence and transport for the so-called G5 group of Sahel countries, backed by UN and French troops, fighting terrorists.

There have been suggestions that President Donald Trump is losing interest in this battle and France Armed Forces Minister Florence Parly is heading to Washington to urge him to maintain his support.   

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He was speaking at a summit in Pau he hosted for the five countries facing increasing violence from the so-called Islamist State in Greater Sahara.

President Emmanuel Macron is concerned about the anti-French sentiment expressed in Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Chad and Burkina Faso about its military support for the fight against jihadis.

France has 4500 troops in the region where it stepped in to stop Mali being overrun by terrorists.

At the Pau summit he committed a further 220 troops to the operation which will now have a joint command structure.

The six countries present called on the United States to continue what they called its crucial support for their fight.

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President Mahamadou Issoufou of Niger has raced to home to deal with a deadliest  rebel attack on his country in living memory.

A military spokesman in Niger says 73 soldiers were killed in yesterday’s  attack on a base in Inates near the border with Mali.

It follows an attack in Agando, also in the west of the country, on Monday that left four soldiers and 14 rebels dead.

The military spokesman say several hundred attackers were involved and they sustained heavy casualties.

French President Emmanuel Macron has called a meeting in Pau, southwestern France next week of the G5 Sahel group to which Niger belongs with Mali, Mauritania, Chad and Burkina Faso.  

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Speaking at the end of the NATO summit in London, Macron says the Sahel leaders must address anti French sentiment about its role in Africa.

France is the only Western country with a substantial military presence in Africa.

It sent in troops to prevent Mali being overrun by Jihadis in 2013.

It still has 4 500 soldiers helping the so called Sahel G5 comprising Mali, Niger, Mauritania, Chad and Burkina Faso.

French President Emmanuel Macron says if those troops are stay there, African leaders must affirm that they need them.

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Analysts fear that,  like Al Shabaab, the terror group will use relatively soft targets in Africa to show it is still operational.

So-called Islamic State has made its deadly presence felt in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Northern Mozambique, Mali and Burkina Faso.

The news portal Defence Web says this should of concern to South Africa’s National Defence Force which might be called in to protect neighbors from the Southern African Development Community.

The ISIS fighters have not been flown in to African locations. They have come in smaller numbers escaping fighting in Syria and Iraq, bringing with them experience, skills, techniques and tactics.

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25 Malian troops were killed and 78 are missing.

Only 13 soldiers emerged unscathed from the twin attacks on the Boulkessy camp housing Malian forces from the G5 group that includes Burkina Faso, Chad, Mauritania and Niger.

It is unclear whether the 75 missing troops have been killed or captured.

The jihadis, who at one stage held the northern half of Mali before being driven out by French forces, captured 20 vehicles and significant stores of ammunition.   

Two military helicopters and at least 12 vehicles were burned in the attack.

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There’s no suggestion of  France’s operation Burkhane being terminated.

But Foreign Minister Jean-Yves le Drian says it cannot last an eternity.

French troops intervened Mali six years ago to drive out Al Qaeda forces that had seized control of half the country.

There are still 4 500 French troops there. 

France also provides military basic against Islamist militants in Burkina Faso, Chad, Niger and Mauritania. The so-called G5

Foreign Minister Jean Yves le Drian tells the parliamentary foreign affairs committee in Paris that countries of Sahel should not stay in the comfort zone of thinking that Burkhane is forever behind them.

African security in the longer term will have to be secured by African nations themselves.

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It comes as France has announced its intention to return African works of art looted during the colonial era.

Senegal’s first President Leopold Senghor presented a post-colonial cultural vision of Africa 52 years ago.

Spending up to a quarter of the national budget on the arts,  he hosted world festivals of featuring the greatest international black artists and entertainers.

Economic realities pushed these into the background until a $34-million Chinese investment enabled President Macky Sall to build the museum in Dakar 

In a structure modeled on Great Zimbabwe, it’s said to compare with the National Museum of African American History in Washington.

First exhibits are from Mali, Burkina Faso, Cuba and Haiti.

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