“It’s a historic page that we write with the gathering of all nationalists and separatists,” said Pascal Sawa, first deputy secretary general of the Caledonian Union. Representatives of various independence movements in New Caledonia displayed and proclaimed their unity on Sunday, in Nouméa, at the end of the 41st Congress of the FLNKS, the Kanak and Socialist National Liberation Front.
They intended to validate “the unique trajectory which sets the framework for bilateral decolonization discussions”, according to the motion adopted by the ten political, customary, trade union, associative and religious organizations represented at the congress, which brought together several hundred people over two days. . It is a question of “demonstrating to the State that we are still there”, underlined Luc Wéma, former customary senator. “There is now only one word, in the name of the Kanak people and in the name of our chiefdoms,” he added.
Re-establishing a constructive dialogue
Only the Nationalist Independentist Sovereignty Movement did not participate in the Congress, specifying however in a press release that it is counting on the FLNKS “to find the ways and means of renewing a constructive and political dialogue necessary for better institutional visibility”.
“The colonial state knows how to divide. We must not reproduce what happened in Wadrilla,” urged Christian Tein, commissioner general of the Caledonian Union when receiving the non-member delegations of the FLNKS. He was referring to the assassination in 1989, in Wadrilla on the island of Ouvéa, of the Kanak independence leader Jean-Marie Tjibaou and his right-hand man in the FLNKS, Yeiwéné Yeiwéné, by a Kanak militant, Djubelly Wéa, opposed to the accords of Matignon in 1988.
Each organization will have a representative on the separatist Strategic Committee, which will be responsible for defining the terms of discussion with the representatives of the State.
Visit of Darmanin
The Minister of the Interior and Overseas Gérald Darmanin is due to visit New Caledonia next week, from March 3 to 5, in order to “continue” the cycle of discussions on the institutional future of the archipelago. This will be his second visit, after a stay in December. A meeting is scheduled for Tuesday to set the framework for discussions with the minister.
Three referendums rejected the independence of the South Pacific territory, but the legitimacy of the last ballot, organized in December 2021 in the midst of the Covid pandemic, was strongly contested by the FLNKS. In the motion adopted on Sunday by the separatists, the decision to maintain it was described as “an affront to the people of New Caledonia”.