SYDNEY/PARIS, May 17 (Reuters) - French police reinforcements have started arriving in New Caledonia as part of a massive operation to regain control of the capital Noumea, the top French official in the Pacific island territory said on Friday.
The number of police and gendarmes on the French-ruled island will rise to 2,700 from 1,700 by Friday evening.
“The rioting erupted over a new bill, adopted by lawmakers in Paris on Tuesday, that will let French residents who have lived in New Caledonia for 10 years vote in provincial elections.”
Wow, I need some more historical context on voting in new Caledonia and how this reform is leading to fatalities and such huge riots.
I don’t have all the details but I believe that the native population (the Kanak) managed to get an agreement a few decades ago to make sure only they could vote in their local elections. This was done and seen as an anti-colonial move.
Recently the French government, without a care in the world or of its word, decided to revert this agreement without actually consulting the ones mostly impacted by it, i.e. the Kanak, and allow residents to vote as well (you would need a 10 years residence in New Caledonia to be able to vote) I believe there was a referendum about voting rights and independence but abstention was really high so the results are not very representative, and given that France doesn’t give abstention/null voting any value, the government chose to ignore the population’s actual feelings and do its own thing.
It’s a pretty interesting move given the current context and the support France has given to Israel.
Not that I particularly care to defend the french government, but there was 3 referendums, with voting restrictions in favor of the kanak, as per an agreement between the government and the kanaks. The first 2 went against independence and the kanaks decided to boycott the third (the polling was going against independence, again)
Does that mean all is fine and dandy? Obviously not, but I don’t think the story is as one sided as “classic french colonialism”