This paper uses descriptive method to analyse the origin and the seemingly intractable but avoidable ancillary factors that plunged Côte d'Ivoire, which was once the island of political stability, the showcase of economic prosperity and success in West Africa in the fangs of civil war. The paper surveys the policies of the colonial and postcolonial state till the death of President Félix Houphouët-Boigny, the post-Houphouët era and its lot of political and socio-economic upheavals and the mismanagement of the legacies of Boigny that led to the internal conflict. The consequences of the civil strife are also surveyed at the national and sub-regional levels as well as the resolutions of the conflict through the botched Accra peace initiatives that inexorably led to the Lina-Marcoussis peace talks. The aftermath of the negotiations and the involvement of extra-African powers and the future of democracy in Côte d'Ivoire are also looked into.
Ethnicity; Democracy; Religion; Conflict