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Tensions over upcoming elections and the barring of an opposition candidate are mounting in a country where electoral violence once spiralled into war.Fake stories of a coup d’etat in the West African nation of Ivory Coast surfaced this week amid mounting tensions over the upcoming October general elections.

Several accounts on social media sites, including Facebook and X, posted videos of huge crowds on streets with burning buildings, which they claimed were from the country’s commercial capital, Abidjan.However, no violence was reported by security forces or any other government authorities in the city this week. Abidjan residents also denied the claims on social media.On Thursday, the country’s National Agency for Information Systems Security of Ivory Coast (ANSSI) denied the rumours.

In a statement published on local media sites, the agency said: “Publications currently circulating on the X network claim that a coup d’etat has taken place in Cote d’Ivoire [Ivory Coast] … This claim is completely unfounded. It is the result of a deliberate and coordinated disinformation campaign.”The rumours come just weeks after popular opposition politician Tidjane Thiam was barred from running for office after his eligibility was challenged in court over a technicality relating to his citizenship status. Thiam is appealing the ruling and claims the ban is political.

Ivory Coast, Africa’s cocoa powerhouse, has a long history of election violence, with one episode a decade ago spiralling into armed conflict that resulted in thousands of deaths.

Fears that President Alassane Ouattara might run for a fourth term have added to the tensions this time. Although the country has a two-term limit for presidents, a constitutional amendment in 2016 reset the clock on his terms, the president’s supporters argue, allowing him to run for a third five-year term in 2020. That same argument could also see him on the ballot papers this October, despite what experts say is widespread disillusionment with the political establishment in the country.The company is betting that its “fail fast, learn fast” approach will eventually pay off. Still, it acknowledged in a statement that progress “won’t always come in leaps”.

In issuing approval for Tuesday’s test, the FAA said it had nearly doubled the airspace closure zone to 1,600 nautical miles (2,963 km) east of the launch site.The Starship test involved coordination with authorities in the United Kingdom, the British-controlled Turks and Caicos Islands, the Bahamas, Mexico and Cuba, according to the AFP news agency.

The FAA also recently approved an increase in annual launches from five to 25 – stating that the increased frequency would not adversely affect the environment, and overruling objections from conservation groups.The FAA’s changes come as Musk has played a prominent role in US President Donald Trump’s second administration, claiming to focus his attention on what he describes as “billions, hundreds of millions of dollars of