Although there are no official statistics for the rate of suicide in the Ivory Coast, the phenomenon has increasingly been making newspaper headlines. Allo Police, an Ivorian newsweekly, recently published a number of stories about suicide. In most cases, the stories share striking similarities.
Martin Abo, a 24-year-old student from Abidjan, recently attempted to take his own life as an expression of anger towards his family. He described wanting to leave a world in which he felt he was misunderstood. But his attempt at suicide was unsuccessful. E.K, a hairdresser in Abidjan's Marcory district, shares a similar story.
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