Situated on the Western coast of Africa, Ivory Coast or Côte d'Ivoire is a former French colony that has celebrated its independence since 1960 with the leadership of President Felix Houphouet-Boigny. For four decades the nation flourished and become a regional economic powerhouse as well as a blueprint for "religious and ethnic harmony" as covered by the BBC.
In 2002 an armed rebellion saw the country split into two – it came following a controversial election of President Laurent Gbagbo in 2000. The country was violently divided into Muslim rebel-held north and government-controlled Christian south and since then had been grappling with violent civil wars. And yet despite the political instability within the country, Ivory Coast is the world's largest exporter of cocoa beans, generating a relatively stable and high income for its society.
The media of Ivory Coast operates under stringent government control and there are no privately operated TV channels.
