NOUMEA (Islands Business / Pacific Media Watch): The struggle of the indigenous Kanaky people of New Caledonia is gathering momentum ahead of this weekend's elections, reports a regional news magazine.
"For the first time since 1989, the independence movement is presenting a united ticket in the Southern province, in a bid to gain a majority in New Caledonia’s Congress," wrote independent journalist Nic Maclellan in Islands Business.
The united front is made up of the Front de Libération Nationale Kanak et Socialiste (FLNKS), Parti Travailliste (PT), Dynamique Unitaire Sud (DUS), Libération Kanak Socialiste (LKS) and the local branch of the French Socialist Party.
The new Congress needs a 60 percent majority if it wants to set up a referendum on independence from France - something that the indigenous Kanaky movements have long been campaigning for. An obstacle is that as many as 6700 French citizens who had settled in New Caledonia had been put on the electoral roll, and they are likely to vote against liberation from France.
The FLNKS has long maintained that the French government - even though it is supposed to be overseeing a process of decolonisation - in fact aims to make the Kanak a minority in order to maintain its sovereignty and interests in New Caledonia. There have been repeated disputes over Kanaky people who have been excluded from the voters roll while French citizens have been added to it.
Maclellan attended a Kanaky campaign meeting in Paita and reported that several indigenous parties also spoke of inequalities between indigenous and non-indigenous New Caledonians:
For Marie-Pierre Goyetche of the Parti Travailliste (Labour Party), the issue is employment. Goyetche, president of the USTKE trade union confederation, highlights the need for training for young Kanaks, so they can compete in the jobs market with migrants arriving from France or Wallis and Futuna. For Jean-Pierre Deteix of the Socialist Party, the challenge is housing, with 8000 people living in squatter settlements around Noumea and thousands more seeking adequate public housing. Yvon Faua of the Rassemblement Démocratique Océanien (RDO) talks of education, the challenges for Kanaks and islanders to succeed in the French education system and the importance of the school as a place to develop civic values.
Sylvain Pabouty (DUS) and Louis Mapou (Palika) highlight the need for economic development to build an independent nation. But then Roch Wamytan takes to the stage. Wamytan heads the rainbow electoral ticket, as a high chief from Saint Louis, a former President of the FLNKS, a past chair of the Melanesian Spearhead Group (MSG) and currently Speaker of New Caledonia’s outgoing Congress.
The veteran Kanak leader calls on the audience to rally their friends, family and neighbours to vote next Sunday, May 11.
“Our opponents always forget their history,” he says. “But these elections are part of the long struggle of the Kanak people to determine the future of our nation, our rainbow nation, and to develop as a sovereign country.”
According to Maclellan, an increased vote for the Mouvement Nationaliste Unitaire (a united front of pro-independence parties) in the March 2013 local government elections bodes well for this week's elections
"This week is the 25th anniversary of the death of Kanak independence leader Jean-Marie Tjibaou on 4 May 1989. Tjibaou’s vision of an independent Kanaky still inspires the movement, even as the challenges of building a new nation remain," wrote Maclellan.
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