New Caledonia | After the dissolution, electoral reform at an impasse

(Nouméa) At the origin of the riots in New Caledonia, the constitutional bill modifying the electoral body of the French archipelago in the South Pacific seems more than ever to be deadlocked or even “null” after the dissolution of the Assembly national, which gives hope to the separatists.

“The president has lost his hand, it is we who have it now and we say that we must go towards provincial elections with a frozen body,” underlines Daniel Goa, president of the main independence party, the Caledonian Union ( UC), even if he does not consider this dissolution “a victory”.

“The mobilization is not over,” continues the official, interviewed by AFP.

The reform project, which has provoked unprecedented violence since the 1980s in the “Caillou”, aims to expand the electorate – frozen since 2007 – for provincial elections, crucial in the territory.

Around 25,000 voters, natives or residents for 10 years, could join the electoral list, at the risk of marginalizing the indigenous Kanak people, accuse the separatists.

After the votes of the Senate on April 2 and the Assembly on May 14, the project must still be adopted by the Parliament meeting in Congress in Versailles.

But on Sunday, French President Emmanuel Macron responded to the far-right’s historic victory in the European elections by announcing a surprise dissolution of the National Assembly, and the calling of legislative elections to take place on June 30 and July 7.

For the Kanak Liberation Party (Palika), the matter is settled: “we can agree together that the European elections will have overcome constitutional law,” he wrote in a press release published on Wednesday.

“Everyone must now admit” that this reform “and the timetable attached to it are indeed obsolete,” continues this moderate independence movement, calling for “lifting the roadblocks and blockages.” “The time must be for the reconstruction of peace and social bonds,” underlines the Palika.

The outgoing Renaissance deputy Philippe Dunoyer, who has announced that he will run again in the legislative elections, intends to “restore discussions at all costs to reach an agreement by consensus” between loyalists and separatists, even if he is not unaware of the “difficulties” to come.

Rapporteur of the bill to the Assembly, Nicolas Metzdorf of the Macronist party says he continues to believe in possible adoption. “The text remains in the circuit […]. We will see if the president or the new majority want to pass the text to Congress,” he indicated on Nouvelle-Calédonie La 1re.

The scenario seems very improbable.

“In theory, it would be entirely possible to be able to continue the constitutional revision process later, once the National Assembly is again constituted,” notes to AFP Léa Havard, lecturer in public law at the University of New Caledonia.

But, she points out, “it is mentioned in article 2 that the constitutional revision will come into force on July 1, 2024. However, it will be impossible to adopt this text before” this date, due to a lack of deputies to vote for it in Congress alongside senators, with the second round of legislative elections taking place on July 7.

“We could imagine adopting this constitutional revision at the end of July or in August”, once the deputies are elected, “even if it mentions an entry into force at the beginning of July. From a strictly legal point of view, this is not impossible. But from a political point of view, it doesn’t really make sense,” explains the professor.

In any case, the separatist Daniel Goa does not seem perturbed by the possibility that his next interlocutor will be the far-right National Rally (RN) party which came well ahead in the European elections, if it wins the next legislative elections, or even the presidential election planned for 2027.

“Whether it’s Macron or Le Pen, it won’t change much. […] Le Pen does not scare us, they are nationalists. We are also nationalists, but in our country. This is not the case with Macron,” he says.

After being one of the most virulent critics of the Matignon agreements in 1988 and that of Nouméa ten years later, the RN recently revised its Caledonian doctrine.

While Marine Le Pen considered the result of the third referendum on independence in 2021 “final” – boycotted by the separatists, who do not recognize the victory of the “no” – she suggested in May a new consultation by “ forty years “.