Abéché, Zakouma & the East

The east was the heart of the Ouaddaï sultanate, founded in the 17th century by Abd al-Karim, who established Islam and a capital at Ouara. Ouaddaï grew into one of the most powerful states of the central Sahel, raiding south for slaves and ivory and sending caravans north across the Sahara to Kufra and Benghazi. In the 19th century the capital moved to Abéché, where the sultans built mosques and palaces, and Ouaddaï fought long wars with its neighbours, Darfur to the east and Baguirmi to the west.

France occupied Abéché in 1909 but met stubborn resistance, and the region was not fully subdued until after the First World War. In 1917 French forces killed a large number of religious scholars and notables in Abéché, an event still remembered as the "coupe-coupe" massacre. The colonial state invested little in the east, and in 1965 riots over taxes at Mangalmé in Guéra were followed by the armed rebellion of FROLINAT, which spread across the centre and east.

Since then the region has been shaped by events across the Sudan border. Chadian rebels have used Darfur as a base, and Sudan's conflicts have repeatedly spilled over: in the mid-2000s refugees from Darfur arrived in large numbers, and since 2023 the war in Sudan has brought a new and even larger influx.

The east is overwhelmingly Muslim and speaks many languages. The Maba and related peoples of Ouaddaï, the Zaghawa and Tama of Wadi Fira, the Dajo and Masalit of Sila, Arab herding groups and, in the mountains of Guéra, the Hadjarai — "people of the stones" — each keep their own speech, while Chadian Arabic links them all. Families often have relatives on both sides of the Sudan border.

Abéché remains a religious centre, with Quranic schools and a tradition of scholarship, and the Sultan of Ouaddaï still holds a traditional role. Among the Hadjarai, the margaï, spirits linked to particular hills and places, continue to be honoured alongside Islam. Weddings, naming ceremonies and the two Eids are the great social occasions, often marked by horsemen and drumming.

Hospitality is a strict obligation: guests are served sweet tea in several rounds and a bowl of food whatever the household's means. Modest dress is expected, and men and women usually socialise separately.

Abéché is the largest town in the east and its commercial and administrative centre, with a university and a busy trade in livestock and goods from Sudan and Libya. The other main towns — Mongo in Guéra, Am Timan in Salamat, Goz Beïda in Sila and Biltine in Wadi Fira — are small, and most people live in villages.

The economy rests on herding cattle, camels, sheep and goats, and on farming millet and sorghum in the rains and vegetables in the wadis. Gum arabic, tapped from acacia trees, is an important cash crop. Every year herders move south with their animals in the dry season and north again with the rains.

The refugee emergency dominates the region. Camps established for Darfuris in the 2000s have been joined since 2023 by new settlements around Adré and elsewhere along the border, where refugees outnumber local residents in places and water, firewood and food are in short supply.

The east eats in the Sahelian and Sudanese way. The staple is esh, the Chadian Arabic name for boule, a stiff porridge of millet or sorghum eaten from a shared bowl with sauces of okra, dried meat or vegetables. Charmout, strips of beef or mutton dried in the sun, is pounded into sauces, and kissar, a thin fermented sorghum pancake, is served with stews.

Milk is central to the herding diet: fresh or soured cow's and camel's milk is drunk daily, and butter is clarified for cooking. Meat is grilled for guests and festivals, and dried okra and baobab leaves thicken sauces through the dry season.

The drinks are sweet tea, often flavoured with mint or spices, karkanji made from hibiscus flowers, and a tart drink of baobab fruit pulp. Dates come from the north, and honey and gum arabic are sold in the markets.

Zakouma National Park in Salamat is the region's great sight. Its floodplains, woodland and seasonal pans hold elephant herds that fell to a few hundred by around 2010 through poaching and have since grown again under strict protection, along with buffalo, Kordofan giraffe, hartebeest, lions and large gatherings of cranes and waterfowl at the dry-season pools. Black rhinoceros were reintroduced in 2018, but four died within months and poachers killed the last two in 2025.

In the centre, the Guéra massif rises abruptly from the plains around Mongo in granite domes, needles and boulder fields, with Hadjarai villages built among the rocks and the Abou Telfane reserve in its hills.

To the north-east, the Ouaddaï highlands are a country of rocky hills, wadis and acacia savannah. Abéché, their capital, has an old quarter of narrow lanes, mud-brick mosques, the remains of the sultans' palace and a large souk where leather, cloth and livestock change hands. North of the town lie the ruins of Ouara, the earlier capital. Further east, towards Adré and the Sudan border, the land is dominated by the refugee camps, and it is not a place for visitors.