The central African state of Chad is one of the most under-reported countries in the world.

So what’s going on in the African country you probably haven’t heard of despite it being a petrolium-exporter that is deeply involved in the war on terror?

Well, the president recently won a referendum basically designed to install him for life and the government has been cracking down on the press.

Recently, four independent journalists have recently been jailed for “inciting hatred” — against the government.

In the most recent case, Sy Koumbo Singa Gali of L’Observateur was jailed for one year after she interviewed a government critic.

Meanwhile, the World Bank-funded oil pipeline project isn’t quite the model of transparency it was meant to be. The World Bank is very concerned about the finding of a recent report from Chad’s petrolium oversight organisation:

The report cites incidents of irregularities in transfers of funds; poor quality of, and long delays in the delivery of goods and services; and lack of competitive bidding processes, and cases of overpricing of goods and services. It also assesses that some local authorities were not informed of projects planned in locales under their administrative responsibility.

The full reports can be found here.