Forty days after his arrest, Succès Masra, president of the opposition party Les Transformateurs and a key figure in Chadian politics, addressed the nation from his prison cell through a powerful letter titled “Letter from a Chadian Prison.”
The message, read aloud on June 24 at the party’s headquarters in N’Djamena, went beyond his personal plight to deliver a call for hope, unity, and peaceful mobilisation.
Hundreds of supporters gathered in the Habbena district, where the atmosphere was filled with emotion. Songs, chants, and the national anthem preceded the solemn reading of the letter by activist Nonyal Félicité.
In the letter, Masra recounts his arrest at dawn on May 16 but quickly broadens the scope: the real prison, he argues, is the one in which an entire nation lives—trapped by poverty, injustice, exclusion, unemployment, corruption, and insecurity.
He denounces a system that suffocates Chad through various forms of domination—ethnic, religious, social, and military—and calls for an inclusive, peaceful struggle that unites all segments of society.
“My freedom is no more important than that of the people,” he writes.
Masra reflects on his movement’s journey, marked by four years of resistance, repression, and forced exile. In a poignant moment, he recalls his daughter questioning his absence on her birthday. “Freedom is not free,” she replies.
He pays tribute to the youth, the diaspora, and all who continue to stand tall despite hardship, urging Chadians to rise and keep moving forward: “Whatever happens to me, you must lift your heads and advance.”
Masra also announced a hunger strike, in solidarity with the people and as a protest against the injustices afflicting the country: “From here in prison, it is the only way I can demand the unleashing of our people’s full potential.”
More than a cry of anguish, the letter is a call for unity, justice, equality, and fraternity—a message of faith in a better future for Chad. “No matter how long it takes,” Masra concludes, “dignity will prevail. When the road is hard, only the determined carve the way.”
CA/te/lb/as/APA