Civilian killed by a soldier in Kousseri

A soldier shot and killed a 46-year-old man in cold blood on the night of November 11 in Hile-Hausa neighbourhood of Kousseri. The fatal incident was reported by L'Oeil du Sahel on November 16.

The newspaper put together the facts from investigations by police and from the brother of Mahamat Abdoulaye, the victim, called Abdellai.

According to the report, the victim was in the home of his father, Djibrine Mahamat, when he sent his 14-year-old son to buy him milk. According to Abdellai "around 8:10 p.m., the child went cycling. 10 m from the house where he met two individuals in civilian clothes. They were a little tipsy and asked him for the receipt of the bike. The child replied that he had none. Then they asked him to hand over the bike. The child refused and turned around because they wanted snatch it from him. They chased him to the door of the house where the child threw the bike inside the house. The two people grabbed him and began beating him. Cousins ?who were next to the door got to the scene and started a fight. The deceased and his brother, Mahamat Djibrine, inside the house, also came out. Djibrine Mahamat came out first and grabbed one of the two men to know why they were assaulting people in the house," he said.

The rest was bloody: "The soldier who had at the time an iron bar, hit him with the object. Meanwhile, the other man (Corporal Jonathan Apollinaire Manga, commissioned in 41th BIM - Editor's note) ran home, which was not far away, to take his weapon. Returning with his weapon in hand, the children saw him and began to scream. People rushed home, but Abdoulaye and Djibrine did not leave. They stayed outside the door. The military man first fired two shots at the door, then turned against Abdoulaye and fired three shots at him. Meanwhile, his friend who had held Djibrine kept asking the other to shoot him. When he was about to, Djibrine managed to hide behind the soldier and he was rather shot at the hip. I was called at 8:40 p.m., I immediately arrived at the scene where I found Abdoulaye dead and the soldier lying there. I carried the body of my brother to the hospital," the brother of the deceased narrated.

Though Mahamat Abdoulaye was buried the day after the tragedy, the case is far from over. Pending the outcome of the investigation, people say they are irritate?d by these repeated blunders.