France’s new Minister for Overseas, François-Noël Buffet, arrived in New Caledonia on Wednesday, five months after violent riots broke out.
Buffet is scheduled to spend four days there, with high on his agenda to reaffirm France’s commitment to New Caledonia’s post-riots’ recovery amid a backdrop of economic, social and societal collapse.
Since the unrest started, New Caledonia has sustained significant damage to its economy, with an estimated total material cost of some €2.2 billion (US$2.28 billion), over 800 businesses were looted and destroyed by arson, and close to 20,000 jobs lost.
There were also several hundred injured and thirteen dead (eleven civilians and two French gendarmes).
Since May, France has provided around €400 million (US$434 million) in emergency assistance to essential services.
But that was in emergency mode: New Caledonia’s Congress says more is needed on a longer-term basis.
It has also formed a bipartisan committee which recently presented in Paris a five-year “salvage, refoundation and reconstruction” (S2R) plan, asking for France to fund a total of €4.2billion (US$4.56 million).
The plan is to be officially presented on Thursday during a dedicated conference in Nouméa, which Buffet is also expected to attend.
“I am here to try to be efficient and very pragmatic. I am in a working and listening spirit”, Buffet told reporters soon after his arrival.
“The French State will continue to be mobilised for a long time, given the work that needs to be done and the reconstruction that is necessary, independently of the bonds of trust that must be restored.”
Buffet also pointed out that he has travelled to New Caledonia twice over the past five years, including last March, when he came in his then capacity of chairman of the French Senate’s Law Committee.
Part of his schedule has already involved the protocolar wreaths laying ceremony at the war memorial in downtown Nouméa, in the presence of a large panel of foreign diplomats, local MPs and government members, as well as provincial officials.
Over the next four days, he is scheduled to hold talks with political, economic players, as well as New Caledonia’s mayors.
These will include the President of the local government, Louis Mapou, the presidents of the three provincial assemblies (North, South and Loyalty Islands), the president of the Congress (Parliament) and representatives of the Chiefly Senate.
He also intends to hold talks with most of the political parties, both loyalists (pro-France) and pro-independence represented at local institutions.
The main objective is to “restore the bonds of dialogue” and restore a sense of “trust” after months of rioting that has further increased New Caledonia’s polarisation.
The events have also compounded open fractures within both the pro-independence and pro-France camps. Buffet will also take time to meet members of the security forces that have been mobilised over the past five months.
He told the Chiefly Senate on Wednesday that “the idea is to try to continue the path in good conditions.
“Nobody can deny the importance of history. We are the result of history. We collectively bear the responsibility for paving the way to the future…so that dialogue and appeasement can return”, he told the traditional Kanak chiefs during a custom ceremony.
Since a series of three referendums conducted in 2018, 2020 and 2021 yielded three times a majority of rejections to New Caledonia’s independence – though the one in December 2021 was largely contested by the pro-independence camp after they called for a boycott – in line with the guidelines provided by the 1998 Nouméa Accord, political players are required to gather and examine “the situation thus generated” and come up with a new political agreement, on the basis of inclusive bipartisan talks.
Those expected talks are supposed to produce a political agreement that would serve as the successor of the 26-year-old Nouméa Accord.
Over the past three years, attempts by the French government to act upon this and bring everyone to the same table have consistently failed.
The attempted way to put pressure on local politicians by initiating a Constitutional reform process on the sensitive issue of the electoral roll for provincial elections has now been abandoned, French Prime Minister Michel Barnier said during his general policy speech before the French National Assembly earlier this month.
It is understood the sensitive issue (including the required minimum length of continuous residency [3, 5 or 10 years, the latter being most often mentioned] needed to qualify as a potential New Caledonia citizen) was however not discarded altogether, as it would still need to be part of larger political talks when those resume on an inclusive basis.
