Chad’s minister for morality and good governance has been sacked and charged with corruption, accused of stealing hundreds of thousands of dollars in funds meant for cracking down on graft, officials said on Monday.
Ahmadaye Al Hassan was sacked on Sunday night as the oil-producing Central African nation’s anti-corruption minister before the state prosecutor and head of the judicial police read him his charges in person on Monday.
“They came this morning to tell me that I have been charged with fraud and stealing public funds, which I deny,” Al Hassan told Reuters by telephone on Monday.
A policeman close to the investigation, who asked not to be named, told Reuters Al Hassan had been accused of diverting several credit lines and stealing some 360 million CFA francs ($722 400) that had been meant for corruption probes.
Several other officials in Al Hassan’s ministry were arrested late last week.
Chad has produced oil for nearly a decade but the country’s economy has been hamstrung by years of instability and being land-locked.
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