Last updated in October 2009
Political relations
The Federal Republic of Germany was, after France, the first European country to establish diplomatic relations with Chad in 1960. Since 1963, there has been a German Embassy in N’Djamena. Germany is highly regarded in Chad on account of the close relations between the two countries over the past decades and thanks to the substantial development cooperation Germany has continued to provide to the present day. This is particularly true as Germany is not seen to be pursuing a hidden agenda with its assistance. The German Federal Government’s announcement in early 2008 that it intends to remove Chad from its list of development cooperation partners therefore met with disappointment in N`Djamena. Bilateral cooperation will be wound up in 2011/12, though humanitarian and multilateral aid programmes as well as development-oriented emergency and transitional aid will carry on, which means that Germany will continue to make a substantial contribution to resolving Chad’s problems. Chad is also aware that Germany sees respect for human rights and the establishment of democratic institutions and the rule of law in the country as important for bilateral relations.
Besides Germany, the only other EU country to maintain an embassy in Chad is France. The EU Commission also has its own delegation there.
In consultation with its EU partners in Chad, Germany supports the process of democratic dialogue initiated by the agreement between the government and the opposition parties signed on 13 August 2007, which was primarily designed to lead to voting rights reform with a view to the parliamentary elections scheduled for mid-2010 and has since largely achieved its objective. The principal rebel groups, which made another attempt to overthrow the government by force in May 2009, have unfortunately not yet joined this dialogue for a number of reasons. That is why, despite their recent defeat, they continue in the medium term to constitute an external threat to this process of democratic renewal.
Development cooperation
Germany’s trade relations with Chad are insignificant. Germany is not known to have made any investments in Chad. Over a period of nearly five decades, though, the country has received substantial bilateral development assistance, which has been used mainly for poverty reduction. In 2007, this was worth a total of 26 million euros and probably remains at the same level today. Bilateral assistance, including humanitarian aid for the refugee camps in the east and south of the country, is provided through development agencies (the Development Loan Corporation, the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammanarbeit and the German Development Service) as well as non-governmental organizations such as HELP, the Johanniter Emergency Relief Organization, Misereor, Bread for the World, the Diakonisches Werk and the Diakonische Katastrophenhilfe (Emergency Humanitarian Aid Agency) of the Evangelical Church in Germany and CARE Germany. EIRENE provides assistance for internal conflict resolution.
The single most important development cooperation project is currently still concerned with decentralized rural development (Phases 2 and 3 worth a total of 32 million euros). As part of development-oriented emergency and transitional aid, East Chad currently receives approximately 7.5 million euros each year in aid. In autumn 2008, a Technical Cooperation agreement was concluded with the Lake Chad Basin Commission to provide 3 million euros for the sustainable use of resources. An agreement was signed with CEMAC on another regional project to provide 0.5 million euros for AIDS reduction and prevention.
In addition, Germany provides substantial humanitarian aid for the refugee camps in the east and south of the country via multinational and German NGOs.
The assistance provided so far – including that from other donors such as the EU, the World Bank and the African Development Bank – has by and large stabilized the social situation in Chad over the past two years and to this extent has helped to develop the country further. So far, however, there has been only very tentative evidence of any real development, in the sense of a self-supporting economic upturn resulting in the creation of sustainable modern government, social and economic institutions. The effects of the global economic and financial crisis on Chad have been felt especially through the decline in revenue from crude oil production, thus limiting the government’s options to pursue a rigorous policy of economic development and poverty reduction. They constitute a substantial setback for the country, the full scale of which is not yet visible at present. In this situation, foreign aid remains indispensable.
Cultural relations
Bilateral cultural relations are limited, as Chad has a very strong Francophone bias. Germany’s commitment is confined to scholarship programmes. The German language is barely in evidence. Given the generally very low level of education, Chad understandably has other priorities at present than promoting the teaching of foreign languages at schools. There are at best occasional tentative efforts to establish cooperation between German and Chadian universities.
Deutsche Welle programmes areoccasionally provided to radio and television stations but the small number of TV connections prevents them from achieving any real reach.
People in Chad have a largely positive but rather vague image of Germany. The country would welcome greater German commitment in education but interest in German teaching at Chad’s schools is in practice limited.
