Despite the ongoing wave of violence in New Caledonia, the constitutional reform is moving ahead following a favorable vote by the Assemblée Nationale on Wednesday, May 15. The government bill, already passed by the Sénat, received 351 votes in favor and 153 against, with left-wing MPs opposing its adoption.
At the heart of the reform is the expansion of the electorate for New Caledonia's provincial elections to include all citizens who have been residents of the country for 10 years. This measure is contested by the pro-independence movement which fears a loss of electoral influence for the Kanak people.
"This could have untold consequences for civil peace," said La France Insoumise (LFI, left-wing) MP Bastien Lachaud. "You will bear the consequences of your actions," said Mathilde Panot, president of the LFI party, to the government. "This text is a step (...) don't give the impression [that a] global agreement is impossible," said Philippe Dunoyer (Renaissance, centrist), referring to the agreement between loyalists and independentists that the government hopes to achieve.
"It will be a question of, collectively and responsibly, finding an agreement that goes beyond the mere thawing [of the electoral body] and takes account of the progress made and the aspirations of everyone," wrote Emmanuel Macron on this issue on Wednesday in a letter to Caledonian representatives. In the "absence" of such an agreement, "Congress would meet before the end of June" to vote on the constitutional revision, he added.
The French president added that he had asked Prime Minister Gabriel Attal and Interior and Overseas France Minister Gérald Darmanin to meet with "representatives of the pro-independence and non-independence political forces in Paris" to "create the conditions for a dialogue involving both parties." The government hopes that this meeting can take place as soon as possible.
If an agreement is reached on a broader constitutional revision, a "new constitutional bill" will be presented by the government, according to Macron. Discussions could focus on the organization of future self-determination and the distribution of powers between the provinces and the government of New Caledonia.
Debates progressed slowly on Tuesday, with Darmanin accusing LFI of parliamentary "obstruction" by defending amendments that sometimes changed only a word or an expression. The LFI rejected the criticism, defending their "editorial" amendments as a strategy to gain speaking time on the reform. They withdrew some amendments while accusing the government of having "lit a fuse."
"A democratic process cannot stop because there is violence on the ground," said Sylvain Maillard, president of the Renaissance party, on Tuesday morning, referring to the violence in the archipelago that has led to over 130 arrests, according to the latest report.
Rassemblement National (RN, far-right) leader Marine Le Pen and her Les Républicains (LR, right-wing) counterpart, Olivier Marleix, pleaded in unison with the majority to maintain the vote. Conversely, the left called for postponement of the review, or withdrawal of the text. André Chassaigne, president of the Communist group, told Attal during the government question session that "calm can only be achieved by withdrawing the constitutional bill."
"The thawing of the electoral body is a major democratic issue, one that cannot be ignored," replied the prime minister. Calling for "the broadest possible political agreement," he also urged "New Caledonian political leaders to seize this outstretched hand."
Before the resumption of debates, Boris Vallaud, president of the Socialist group, called for a meeting with the "contact group" on New Caledonia. The President of the Assemblée Nationale, Yaël Braun-Pivet, has in fact convened this body, which includes the territory's MPs and representatives from each group. "In view of what is happening in New Caledonia, particularly in Nouméa at the moment, we collectively call for calm, for the resumption of dialogue," said Braun-Pivet from the rostrum after about an hour of meeting.
The reform plans to broaden the electorate for New Caledonia's provincial elections. Currently, the electorate is limited to voters registered on lists from a previous 1998 consultation and their descendants. This effectively excludes residents who arrived after 1998 and many natives.
Some 25,000 voters could be added to the electoral roll under the new text, according to New Caledonia's Institute of Statistics. "It is no longer acceptable that today, the proportion of voters excluded from the right to vote in provincial and congressional elections is close to 20%," said LR MP Philippe Gosselin.
In the Sénat, a mechanism was added to allow the suspension of this constitutional reform if a local agreement is reached up to 10 days before the next elections, which would then make the constitutional revision unnecessary.
However, left-wing MPs and independents from Libertés, indépendants, outre-mer et territoires (overseas territories parliamentary group, LIOT) accuse the government of using the "wrong method" in adopting the text, which they say would give loyalists more clout against independentists, even without ratification by Congress. This enlargement is hotly contested by the latter, who accuse the state of wanting to force the issue to "further marginalize the indigenous Kanak people," who accounted for 41.2% of the archipelago's population in the 2019 census, according to the National Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies (INSEE).
Extreme violence has erupted in New Caledonia since Monday night. Stores have been looted, houses have been burnt down and police have been shot at. The French territory in the South Pacific is facing its highest level of tension since the 1980s. In the Nouméa area, the curfew decreed by the French High Commissioner came into force on Tuesday evening at 6:00 pm local time (9:00 am in Paris).
Translation of an original article published in French on lemonde.fr; the publisher may only be liable for the French version.