Cote d'Ivoire, 1991 — military coup conspiracy
Event Summary
This entry is coded 23 July 1991, during a period of unrest and political tension under the aging President Felix Houphouet-Boigny of Cote d'Ivoire, who had ruled since independence in 1960 and had been forced to accept multiparty democracy in 1990. Long regarded as a bastion of stability, the country was shaken in 1990 and 1991 by civil-servant strikes and student protests against corruption and one-party dominance, forcing the government to legalize opposition parties. Tensions peaked with a massive Abidjan demonstration on 31 May 1991, when some 20,000 protesters chanted for Houphouet-Boigny to resign, and with a controversial military raid on university students at the Yopougon campus that became a major scandal and the subject of an official commission of inquiry.
The 23 July 1991 coding sits in this period of anti-Houphouet-Boigny unrest, student agitation, and military involvement in suppressing dissent, at a time when the succession question loomed over an increasingly feeble president. Cote d'Ivoire did not experience an actual coup until 1999.
Researched Details
Researched
Independent research, added record by record. Hover any label for what it means.
Sources
Editorial Note
Cross-Reference
Only one dataset carries it. One of the three reference datasets we check against carries this event; the others do not list it. That is not a contradiction — the datasets cover different periods and use different thresholds — but it means the record has had less outside corroboration.
Identifiers for finding this same event in the other datasets:
- Cline Center id
43707231991
How the match is made is described in crossref-report.md.
Outcome and Target
Coup Atlas research identifies the target as: Houphouet-Boigny weathered the unrest and remained in power until his death in 1993.
Baseline coding: Plot discovered and disrupted before execution. Recorded leader fate: remained in office; not physically harmed. The baseline file does not name individual targets; researched names are kept in a separate layer.
Baseline Dataset Citation
Baseline Source-Document Entries
CSP
Toronto Star
This is the citation trail carried by the baseline dataset, grouped by outlet and rejoined from the line-wrapped original. Coup Atlas has not independently re-checked every document; read the original before citing a specific claim. URLs the import damaged beyond safe repair are shown as plain text and listed in citations-report.md. How this list is built →