On April 15, 1975, two days after the coup that killed President Francois Tombalbaye, General Felix Malloum was installed as head of a nine-member Supreme Military Council that took formal control of Chad, completing the army's takeover. Malloum, the former army chief of staff whom Tombalbaye had imprisoned in 1973 on charges of plotting the so-called Black Sheep Plot, was freed from jail in the hours after the April 13 assault and chosen to chair the new junta. On April 15 the Supreme Military Council (Conseil Superieur Militaire) took office with Malloum at its head.
The council suspended Tombalbaye's 1962 constitution, banned political parties, and arrested a number of the late president's top aides. It made some gestures toward conciliating the Muslim north, but because Malloum and the other leading officers, like Tombalbaye, were Sara from the south, the change of leadership did not produce a major break with the previous regime's policies, and the FROLINAT rebellion continued.
Researched Details
Researched
Independent research, added record by record. Hover any label for what it means.
Target identified in Coup Atlas research: The transitional arrangement after Tombalbaye's death, formalized on April 15, 1975 when Malloum's Supreme Military Council took office; the dataset codes the fate as not physically harmed, distinguishing this installation from the killing two days earlier.
RESEARCHED NAME
Key figures
Felix Malloum (general installed as head of the Supreme Military Council)
Noel Odingar (acting head of state between the coup and the council)
The Supreme Military Council (the new nine-member junta)
Sources
General Odingar acted provisionally as head of state and the jailed officers were immediately freed, among them General Felix Malloum, who was chosen to be chairman of a nine-man military junta named the Supreme Military Council (Conseil Superieur Militaire), that took office on April 15.
The success of the coup did not produce a major break with Tombalbaye's policies, which was not surprising because, like Tombalbaye, both Odingar and Malloum were Sara from the south of Chad, and while the council made some moves to conciliate the north, the Muslims continued to feel themselves second-class citizens and the FROLINAT rebellion continued.
After the coup Malloum was released from prison and named President of a nine-man Supreme Military Council that would administer Chad until a provisional government could be formed, and the junta immediately suspended Tombalbaye's 1962 constitution, banned all political parties, and arrested eight of the president's top aides.
SOURCE REVIEWEDTime, Chad: Death of a Dictatoropen source ↗
General Felix Malloum seized control of the state and took over as head of a seven-member junta after the April 13, 1975 coup that violently deposed Tombalbaye, an outcome that left many issues unaddressed and led to years of further power struggles and conflict.
SOURCE REVIEWEDAssociation for Diplomatic Studies and Training, A Front Row Seat to the 1975 Coup in Chadopen source ↗
Editorial Note
Paired record care: this April 15 record is the formal installation of Malloum's Supreme Military Council; the companion 1975-04-13 record is the coup that killed Tombalbaye, and the two are distinct dataset events (the dataset even codes them differently, killed on April 13 and not physically harmed on April 15). Coding note: the dataset labels the April 15 event a palace coup and codes the fate not physically harmed, reflecting the internal consolidation into the military council after the lethal assault two days earlier; the record treats the outgoing arrangement (acting head Odingar handing to the council) as peaceful. Source nuance: sources give the council's size as seven or nine members; both figures are recorded. Arc note: Malloum's council governed until his power-sharing with Hissene Habre broke down into renewed civil war at the end of the 1970s, separate later events.
Cross-Reference
Only one dataset carries it. One of the three reference datasets we check against carries this event; the others do not list it. That is not a contradiction — the datasets cover different periods and use different thresholds — but it means the record has had less outside corroboration.
Identifiers for finding this same event in the other datasets:
Coup Atlas research identifies the target as: The transitional arrangement after Tombalbaye's death, formalized on April 15, 1975 when Malloum's Supreme Military Council took office; the dataset codes the fate as not physically harmed, distinguishing this installation from the killing two days earlier..
Baseline coding: Incumbent executive removed from power. Recorded leader fate: deposed; not physically harmed. The baseline file does not name individual targets; researched names are kept in a separate layer.
Baseline Dataset Citation
Cline Center Coup d’État Project Dataset, v2.2.2
Peyton, Buddy, Joseph Bajjalieh, Michael Martin, and Andrea Gerald. 2026. Cline Center Coup d’État Project Dataset. Cline Center for Advanced Social Research. V.2.2.2. February 17. University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. doi: 10.13012/B2IDB-9651987_V10
“Chad Junta Names a Chief of State,” by Thomas A. Johnson, April 17, 1975
This is the citation trail carried by the baseline dataset, grouped by outlet and rejoined from the line-wrapped original. Coup Atlas has not independently re-checked every document; read the original before citing a specific claim. URLs the import damaged beyond safe repair are shown as plain text and listed in citations-report.md. How this list is built →