Page 38 - IB Sept-Oct 2020

New Caledonia New Caledonia

polling organisations predicted that support for independence cut extra funding for rural areas and outlying islands; and
was waning. A series of opinion polls throughout 2018 stated change representation from the two Kanak-majority provinces
the Yes vote would only reach between 15 and 34 per cent. in the national Congress. Some members of the alliance, such
Just days before voting, conservative politicians predicted a as President of the Southern Province Sonia Backes, have
70/30 result, expecting a strategic defeat for the indepen- pushed for even more hard line policies, proposing the parti-
dence movement. tion of the country – a clear breach of the Accord.
However, as with the 2016 US presidential elections and the Calédonie Ensemble, led by Philippe Gomes, is the only
Brexit vote, the political elite misread the electorate. French significant anti-independence party that has refused to join
partisans misjudged the strength of support for indepen- The Loyalists. CE was the largest party in New Caledonia’s
dence, especially amongst the colonised Kanak people. This Congress between 2009-2019, but the shock result of the 2018
was highlighted by the strong turnout of a younger generation referendum discredited CE’s policy of engagement with the
who were not born at the time of the violent clashes between independence movement amongst conservative voters. The
1984-88, known as Les évènements, that ended with the 1988 party faced internal splits and was punished at the polls dur-
Matignon-Oudinot Accords. ing 2019 provincial elections and 2020 municipal elections.
Partisans of the French Republic are eager not to make the CE is now running a separate No campaign from The
same mistake in 2020, trying to mobilise conservative voters Loyalists, with Gomes telling Islands Business: “Our No to
who didn’t bother to turn out in 2018. independence is not a bleu-blanc-rouge No. When you look
Thierry Santa is President of New Caledonia and leader of at their campaign materials, you see bleu-blanc-rouge flags
the anti-independence Rassemblement-Les Républicains par- everywhere. But we’re talking about this country, about New
ty. Santa told Islands Business: “Our objective is to improve Caledonia. For this reason we couldn’t participate in their
the tally achieved in the first referendum. Amongst the 33,000 radical campaign, that is in part racist, very anti-Islander and
people who didn’t vote last time, the vast majority live in very anti-independence. This can’t bring anything good to the
greater Noumea. I think a proportion of these people, who country.”
thought the result would be 70/30, didn’t bother to vote. But In the independence camp, the left-wing Party Travailliste
I think that the result in 2018 really disappointed them, and and the trade union confederation USTKE advocated “non-
that will mobilise them to get out and vote the next time.” participation” in the 2018 referendum, arguing the colonised
Veteran independence leader Roch Wamytan agrees the Kanak people alone should vote. This year, however, both are
final result in 2018 stunned pundits and politicians from the calling for a Yes vote, joining other indigenous activists as
anti-independence camp, and gave heart to the FLNKS to the Mouvement Nationaliste pour la Souveraineté de Kanaky
continue with the decolonisation process. (MNSK). Although smaller than the FLNKS, the MNSK will mo-
“Many anti-independence people were quite reassured by bilise pockets of support in the rural north and Loyalty Islands
the polling in 2018,” he told me. “But the final result on the who didn’t vote last time.
night of 4 November 2018 showed quite the contrary: that With indigenous Kanak at around 40 per cent of the popula-
even after 30 years since the Matignon Accords, the desire for tion, however, the independence movement must draw sup-
independence amongst the Kanak people was still very strong. port from other communities to win.
This time, the anti-independence groups are more on the of- Historically, most Wallisian, Futunan and Tahitian voters
fensive. This was also reflected in the May 2019 elections, es- have opposed independence, but there are significant changes
pecially amongst the European voters from the suburbs. When in the Polynesian communities that make up more than 10%
Madame Backes and her group got control of the Southern of the electorate. This is highlighted by the creation of a
Province, they went on the offensive against the Kanak.” new political party Eveil Océanien (EO – Pacific Awakening) in
March 2019. Two months later, the party won three seats in
New political combinations Congress and four in the Southern Province during May 2019
Since the previous vote, there have been significant recon- elections.
figurations in both political camps, and amongst the non- In the 54-member Congress, EO can swing its votes to either
Kanak islander communities. the Loyalist camp (25 seats) or the independence parties (26
This year, six political parties opposed to independence seats) to create a majority. It has used this leverage to gain
have a forged an unwieldy alliance, dubbed “The Loyalists”, seats in the Government, Congressional Committees and
to run a coordinated campaign for a No vote. It includes the Southern Provincial executive, and voted to re-elect Roch Wa-
three parties of the governing Avenir en Confiance coalition, mytan as Speaker of Congress, creating an ‘islander majority’.
and three smaller groups (including the extreme-right Ras- EO president Milakulo Tukumuli told Islands Business that
semblement National). Eveil Océanien wants to use its balance of force in the Con-
The Loyalists have issued a common platform that seeks to gress to change the discussion.
roll back many of the achievements of the Noumea Accord. “We haven’t created a movement to fight for independence
They want to change the way laws can be proposed by mem- or to fight for France – we’ve created a movement to fight
bership of New Caledonia’s collegial, multi-party government; poverty in New Caledonia,” Tukumuli said. “We are a country

38 Islands Business, September/October 2020