Ivory Coast, Abidjan – Manhattan of Tropes
Abidjan is the largest city of Ivory Coast, but it is not the capital. Since 1983 the capital of the state is Yamoussoukro, a inner land city with very hard-to-pronounce name. However, Abidjan is still the administrative center.
Originally, Abidjan was a small fishing village on the Gulf of Guinea coast and today it is a huge city with more than 3,5 million inhabitants. A massive development began there when the French colonial rulers realized its trade potential. At the end of the 20th century a corrupted and degrading city was flooded by huge amounts of people from rural areas. Especially suburbs experienced waves of new settlers who raised level of poverty in the city.
The city has strong industry that is supported mostly by the harbor of Abidjan, the second largest harbor after Lagos in Africa. In Abidjan there are manufactured mostly cars, textiles, food, chemicals, soap, wood (mahogany), and last but not least there is a large oil refinery. A tertiary sector of country’s economy growing important.
There are several important institutions in the city such as University of Abidjan , the National Library of Ivory Coast or the National Museum . The latter was victim of a loot during which its entire gold collection was stolen and the only thing tourists can see today are its dusty shelfs.
An interesting sight tourists can see today St Paul’s Cathedral. Its construction began in 1980 according to plans of Aldo Spirito during the visit of the pope John Paul II. In the time of his second visit in 1985 the cathedral was finished. Political crisis in 2010-2011 led many few hundreds of people to seek asylum there from raging civil war.
Despite the image people have about Abidjan is not bright recently, the city has many opulent nicknames such as – “Manhattan of Tropes”, “Small Manhattan”, “Perl of Lagoons” – that are only enhancing its promising tourism potential. The city has also lively night life, maybe the liveliest in whole Africa and some districts are virtually overflowing with night entreprises of various kinds.
Text: Maxim Kucer
Photo: Wikipedia.org - Zenman (2, 3), Abdllahh, Axe, Ferdinand Reus
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