INTRODUCTION
Situated in West Africa, Côte d’Ivoire has a land surface area of 322,462 Km². It is bound to the East by Ghana, to the North by Burkina Faso and Mali, to the West by Guinea and Liberia and to the South by the Gulf of Guinea. Its political and administrative capital is Yamoussoukro while the economic capital is Abidjan.
The country has about sixty ethnic groups which are divided into four major groups: the Gur, the Mande, the Kwa and the Kru. In 2001, its population was estimated to be 21,504,000 inhabitants, with 26% of them being non nationals. The population is mostly young (40%) and the growth rate for the period 2000-2010 was 2.03%.
Côte d’Ivoire is a secular State where different religious denominations co-exist, the key ones being Islam, Christianity and Animism.
The democratic political regime opted for by the Ivorian people brought a lot of hope during the first three decades of independence.
However, after the death of the first President, the various political actors failed to achieve consensus on a new democratic order. This state of affairs led to political instability over the last two decades with devastating consequences. Thus, the respect for human rights and commitments entered into by Côte d’Ivoire were undermined. These included, among others, the presentation of reports to treaty organs.
It is to address this state of affairs that this initial and combined report is presented. It provides an account of measures taken by Côte d’Ivoire in respect of its obligations under Article 62 of the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights. It presents the institutional and legal framework under which human rights are exercised in Côte d’Ivoire as well as measures taken to implement the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights at the national level.
