Yamoussoukro is currently the de jure capital of the nation of Cote d’Ivoire. The city had a population of 242,744 people in 2010. Yamoussoukro is located 274 km, or 170 miles, from the country’s de facto capital, Abidjan, where most of the government offices and foreign embassies remain. Although Yamoussoukro has some government agencies, most of its economy revolves around nearby fishing and forestry industries and the manufacture of perfumes. The city is divided into four different divisions: Attiégouakro, Didiévi, Tié-diékro, and the surrounding Commune of Yamoussoukro, which contains 169 villages and hamlets.
The history of Yamoussoukro dates back to 1901 when Yamousso, the son of the regional political leader Kouassi N’Go, ran the village of N’Gokro at the time of French colonization. The village had 475 residents and was one of the 129 Akoué villages in the region. In 1909 the Akoué revolted against the newly installed French colonial administration. They burned a French outpost called the Bonzi station which was located seven kilometers, or 4.35 miles, away from N’Gokro. Simon Maurice, a French administrator at the Bonzi station, was spared from death by the personal intervention of Kouassi N’Go.
After the revolt was put down Simon Maurice transferred the French military outpost to N’Gokro. In gratitude, the French built a pyramid as a memorial to Kouassi N’Go and the town of N’Gokro was then renamed Yamoussoukro to pay homage to its political leader. In 1919 the French named Félix Houphouët-Boigny who was born there in ___, the chief administrator of the town. Over the next four decades, Yamoussoukro remained a small commercial center for a surrounding agricultural region.
When France granted Cote d’Ivoire independence in 1960, Félix Houphouët-Boigny became the nation’s first president, serving until his death in 1993. Beginning in 1964, Houphouët-Boigny sponsored the city’s rapid growth, building a modern highway from Abidjan to Yamoussoukro ostensibly to encourage economic growth in the
