Nine leaders of the Group for Consultation of Political Actors (GCAP), the main opposition coalition to the regime of President Mahamat Idriss Déby Itno in Chad, were arrested on Saturday and taken into custody, less than a week before a protest march already banned by the authorities.

"Nine leaders are still being held this morning at the judicial police coordination center," Hissein Abdoulaye, spokesman for the GCAP, told AFP on Sunday. A source within the judicial police, speaking on condition of anonymity, confirmed to AFP that "the political leaders are currently in custody."

The GCAP, which brings together 13 political parties and representatives of civil society, is the only platform to have systematically contested the elections and called for a boycott.

The arrests come as the coalition had called for a "protest and indignation march" on May 2, a mobilization banned by the Minister of Public Safety and Immigration.

In a statement published in mid-April on its social networks, the GCAP called on the population to demonstrate against "injustice, exclusion and for the restoration of our rights, our freedoms and justice".

On Friday, the Minister of Security announced in a statement the dissolution of the GCAP by a ruling of the Supreme Court, demanding that members of the coalition "immediately cease this maneuver, which constitutes a disturbance of public order".

In early October, a constitutional revision establishing a seven-year presidential term, renewable without limit, was passed by an overwhelming majority in Parliament, just under two years after the constitution was adopted by referendum.

This new version, described as "authoritarian" by the opposition, paves the way for President Mahamat Idriss Déby to remain in power indefinitely.

- "Arbitrariness" -

The opposition party "The Transformers" strongly condemned, in a statement, the arrest of the GCAP leaders, asserting that "arbitrariness must not become the rule in our country".

In this text, the party expresses its concern about these arrests, stressing that "these events are disturbingly reminiscent of the arbitrary arrest of the party's president, Succès Masra, since May 16, 2025."

In May 2025, Succès Masra, president of the Transformers and former Prime Minister, was sentenced to 20 years in prison for "incitement to hatred and violence" in a "politically motivated" trial, according to the human rights organization Human Rights Watch (HRW).

Makaila N'Guebla, human rights defender and former advisor to the Chadian presidency (2021-2024), denounced these arrests in a press release Saturday evening, demanding "the immediate and unconditional release" of the GCAP leaders and calling on the international community to react to the "deterioration of the human rights situation in Chad".

Makaila N'Guebla was known for his opposition to the regime of Idriss Déby Itno, father of the current president who ruled Chad from 1990 to 2021. Mr. N'Guebla then became human rights advisor to the presidency under the rule of Déby's son during the political transition, before finally going into exile in France from where he attacks the current governance in Chad.