CHAD:French police began a murder inquiry yesterday after the son of Chadian president Idriss Deby was found dead in his basement in an affluent west Paris suburb.
Brahim Deby (28), once seen as a possible successor to his father, was found at 7am by a caretaker in a corridor adjoining the underground car park of his apartment block.
He had suffered a head wound and a fire extinguisher was found near his body. A post-mortem examination was being carried out last night.
Brahim was the president's oldest son. He was seen as his father's choice of successor in Chad, the poor central African nation which borders the Darfur region of Sudan. But he was widely disliked even by some of his own family, who viewed him as unfit to govern, causing a split within the ruling clan.
The president sacked Brahim as his adviser in June 2006 after he was arrested in a Paris disco for possessing a gun.
Police were called to the nightclub in western Paris after Brahim was involved in a fight and a semi-automatic pistol fell from his pocket.
During a search of his apartment police discovered 375 grams of marijuana and two grams of cocaine. Prosecution lawyers accused him of using a diplomatic suitcase to have the gun delivered to him.
As a result, he received a six-month suspended sentence from a French court.
Following the arrest, he was seen as having fallen out of favour with his father.
The Chadian president's office called the news of Brahim's death a "great shock".
A Chadian diplomatic source in Paris said he did not believe that the murder was politically motivated.
Ranked as the world's most corrupt state, Chad is enjoying an oil boom. However, President Deby, in power since 1990, faces opposition from rebels and survived a coup attempt last year.
A coalition of rebel forces have been fighting a guerrilla war against the president's forces in eastern Chad, claiming that he was fraudulently elected and demanding the holding of free democratic elections to end his clan-based rule.
The president has suffered a string of defections which have boosted the rebel ranks.
Now ill, Mr Deby has also been weakened by a row with the World Bank in Washington over the management of petrodollars.
- (Guardian Service)