On 4 July 1957, the French journal L’Economie: journal d’informations industrielles, financières & agricoles du monde entier examines the consequences of the Loi-cadre Defferre (Reform Act). The Act on the development of overseas territories, drafted by Gaston Defferre, Minister for Overseas France in Guy Mollet’s government, with the support of Félix Houphouët-Boigny, Mayor of Abidjan and the first President of Côte d’Ivoire, and adopted on 23 June 1956, represents an important stage in the process of emancipation of the colonial territories in French Africa (introduction of universal suffrage and a single electoral college, establishment of government councils, extension of the powers of territorial assemblies, administrative reforms, etc.).