DECRYPTION – Before the third and final consultation on “full sovereignty” scheduled for October 2022, the executive brings together the elected representatives of the archipelago.
It is a dream that some members of the executive secretly dare to cherish: to conclude Emmanuel Macron’s five-year term by having lifted the mortgage on New Caledonia, this perilous file for all governments for more than thirty years. By receiving from Wednesday most of the Caledonian elected officials in Paris, the Prime Minister intends to prepare the third and final election on independence, scheduled for October 2022 in the Pacific archipelago. The final step in a unique decolonization process, after two referendums marked by the double victory of the pro-France, in November 2018 (56.7% of the vote) then in October 2020 (53.3%).
Multiple questions
The exercise is subtle for the government. It is impossible to escape this election since it was requested in early April by the separatists: the Nouméa agreement, signed in 1998, cannot be compromised. It is then a question of “Prepare the day after” without delay, we warn in the ranks of the executive, eyes turned to the future of this territory of 270,000 inhabitants located 16,700 kilometers from Paris. “It’s a moment of truth, we have to get out of the ambiguity. Our responsibility is historical ”, believes the Minister of Overseas Affairs, Sébastien Lecornu, who faces a historically divided political class, a reflection of a divided society.
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New Caledonia maintained in France or “Kanaky” dreamed of by the separatists: the Prime Minister wants to push the two camps to explain the consequences of the “yes” and the “no”. At the top of the state, no government has had to plan for the separation of any of its territories since Vanuatu’s independence in 1980. But both hypotheses have been studied. In the event of New Caledonia’s divorce from France, the government does not exclude a “Association agreement”, he explains in a document prepared for the Caledonian elected officials, that Le Figaro procured. But what fate for the Pacific franc, what future for the important nickel industry, what financial resources, in a territory where transfers from the State (1.5 billion euros in 2020) are equivalent to tax revenues? The separatists are summoned by the executive to answer these multiple questions, against the backdrop of concerns about China’s inclinations in the South Pacific.
In the event of staying in France, fewer questions arise, but will it be necessary “Continue the transfer of skills”, in this territory already governed by a very strong autonomy? The pro-France will have to position themselves. “The New Caledonian issue is a huge anesthesia, we must force everyone to take their responsibilities to move forward”, insists a regular interlocutor of the Head of State.
Towards a new status
Whatever the path chosen by the Caledonians, the executive must also imagine a new status for the archipelago by leaving the Nouméa agreement. The Minister of Overseas Territories warned his interlocutors: “I don’t want us to come look for our government later, telling me that the end of the agreement will not have been managed well.”
Non-separatists have already planned to alert the head of government to the risks of a new “Binary referendum” to tight result. “Caledonia at 51-49 will be unlivable. There will be one who will win, but it is the country that will lose ”, warns the deputy (Caledonia together, moderate right) Philippe Gomès, supporter of a “Project referendum”, like the loyalists of the L’Avenir en Confidence coalition. In Caledonian society, the memory of the near civil war of the 1980s remains alive.
Read also :Referendum in New Caledonia: a large majority of French people in favor of independence
In this equation, the question of the date of the referendum will be put on the table for discussion. Should we organize it in September-October 2022, to allow time? Or at the end of the year, before the presidential election? This second track would require accelerating the referendum process, but the executive ensures not to exclude it. A way to leave the possibility of completing this historic process of decolonization before the end of the five-year Macron term.
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