OLD COURTHOUSE

Built in 1911 and characteristic of the reinforced concrete architecture developed from the 1910s onwards, the court of first instance, with its some 650 m² (6,767 sq ft), is considered to be the largest building in the district of France. Formerly the main centre for the administration of justice in the colony, its imposing dimensions (41.30 m long by 15.60 m wide and nearly 9 m high), its classically styled masonry columns and its majestic covered porch forming a balcony upstairs were intended to underline the importance and power of justice. It was within its walls that the anti-colonialist militants of the African Democratic Rally were tried in 1949, including Bernard Dadié, Mathieu Ekra and Jean-Baptiste Mockey, former mayor of Grand-Bassam, secretary general of the PDCI-RDA, ambassador and minister of Côte d'Ivoire. Antechamber of the prison, the courthouse was abandoned in 1954 in favour of the Abidjan court, and ended up showing over time a "perfect state of degradation".
A pathetic carcass invaded by epiphytic plants and graffiti, located in the front row to receive the full force of the destructive caress of the sea spray, with its southern façade exposed to the sea winds and its completely rusty iron reinforcements that shattered the concrete and caused irreparable damage, it still seems to be fighting with the energy of despair against the onslaught of erosion and the invasion of the sea of vegetation that was gradually reducing it to nothing.