#𝐔𝐏𝐃𝐀𝐓𝐄: AS President of New Caledonia Alcide Ponga attends his first Pacific Islands Forum leaders meeting in Honiara this week, the French government in Paris has collapsed.
In a confidence vote in the French National Assembly, there’s been a stunning defeat for Prime Minister François Bayrou. After a 364–194 vote, Bayrou must now present his resignation to French President Emmanuel Macron.
For the embattled President, there aren’t good options. He can choose a new Prime Minister (the seventh since he was first elected in 2017). He can call new elections, but his current coalition already lacks a governing majority in the National Assembly, and it’s unlikely this will change after a new poll. Beyond this, public opinion polls say 2/3 of voters want Macron himself to resign, even though the next presidential elections aren’t due until 2027.
Massive anti-Macron demonstrations are scheduled for 10 September, followed a major trade union strike on 18 September. Last month, an Elabe opinion poll reported: “If François Bayrou’s government does not gain the confidence of the National Assembly, the French are in favour of appointing a new Prime Minister (81%), dissolving the Assembly (69%), and the resignation of Emmanuel Macron (67%).”
Implications for New Caledonia
The defeat of the Bayrou government in Paris has big implications for France’s overseas colonies – especially New Caledonia.
New Caledonia’s Loyalist deputy in the National Assembly, Nicolas Metzdorf, was joined by French Polynesia’s Moerani Frébault and Wallis and Futuna’s Mikaele Seo to vote in support of the Bayrou government. But all other overseas deputies voted to oust Bayrou, including New Caledonia’s second deputy Emmanuel Tjibaou, who is president of the largest independence party Union Calédonienne.
Prime Minister Bayrou’s proposed austerity budget was a key trigger for his ousting, and a new government must try to develop a budget before December. But further delay on budgetary negotiations will affect desperately needed economic aid for New Caledonia, after last year’s political and social crisis. During six months of clashes between Kanak protestors and French security forces, one in six people in the private sector lost their jobs, many local businesses were shuttered, tourist arrivals halved and the crucial nickel sector was disrupted, including the closure of the Koniambo smelter in the Northern Province.
Further delay in forming a new French government in Paris will also affect New Caledonia’s proposed Bougival process – an attempt to forge a new political statute to replace the 1998 Noumea Accord.
Before yesterday’s parliamentary vote in Paris, French Overseas Minister Manuel Valls had been forging ahead to implement the Bougival process, but he’s now out of a job. As a key driver of the Bougival negotiations, there is now uncertainty about whether Valls will hold the same position in a new government.
Beyond this, New Caledonia’s main independence coalition FLNKS has formally rejected the Bougival Accord. Other parties continue to encourage voters to back the agreement, but the chaos in Paris won’t help the process of agreeing on a way forward.
As Overseas Minister, Valls had set out a tight timetable to implement the draft Bougival agreement, which must go through the French Senate and National Assembly and a joint sitting of both houses of parliament, before going to a referendum in New Caledonia in February. But can this happen with the current crisis in Paris? New Caledonia’s provincial elections are due to be held on 30 November (already delayed from May 2024), but the proposed delay of the elections until May/June 2026 requires legislation in the French parliament.
Forum to discuss mission report
This week in Honiara, Pacific leaders are due to receive the report of a Forum mission to New Caledonia last October. After conflict erupted last year on 13 May, Forum leaders offered assistance for mediation and dialogue, and asked to send an information mission. Over months, this was delayed as French diplomats tried to influence the timing and content of the mission. Leaders were unable to travel before the August 2024 Forum in the Kingdom of Tonga, where their report would have carried some weight and relevance.
Instead, the mission was delayed until October 2024. The Forum delegation was led by then Forum Chair Hu’akavameiliku Siaosi Sovaleni, the Prime Minister of Tonga, joined by Cook Islands Prime Minister Mark Brown, Fiji Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka and Solomon Islands Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade Peter-Shanel Agovaka. Forum Secretary General Baron Waqa and Deputy Secretary General Esala Nayasi joined the delegation – the highest-level mission ever to travel to New Caledonia, which became a full member of the regional organisation in 2016.
As the delegation’s report is discussed this week, nearly eleven months after leaders travelled, many things have moved on. The previous French government under Prime Minister Michel Barnier collapsed in December 2024 after 90 days. Prime Minister Bayrou lasted a bit longer, but now he’s gone. The Forum has called for dialogue between all parties in New Caledonia, but the Bougival negotiations came and went last July. The proposed Bougival Accord has been rejected by the largest bloc of independence parties, and even some pro-French politicians.
As leader of the conservative party Rassemblement, which is aligned with Les Républicains in France, President Ponga is a leader of the Loyalist bloc in Noumea and firmly opposed to political independence. As he joins other regional presidents and prime ministers in Thursday’s leaders retreat, the complexities and uncertainties of French politics will affect the debate about the Forum’s contribution to a peaceful decolonisation process in New Caledonia.
Speaking briefly to Islands Business this morning, President Ponga said that he was hopeful that things would progress soon, “but we’ll have to wait and see.”
Attending the Forum this week, President of French Polynesia Moetai Brotherson is due to address an NGO side event on self-determination on Tuesday evening. In Honiara, reacting to the news of the collapse of the French Government, Brotherson said: “This is not the first change of government that French Polynesia has followed at a distance. I hope it will be the last before the next presidential elections!”
“We have a number of dossiers with the French government, notably on health, education and other matters between our ministers and those in Paris,” he said. “We’ll have to wait and see if we’ll have the same interlocutors in the next government. If that isn’t the case, we’ll have to re-explain everything.”
On New Caledonia, President Brotherson said: “There will be an impact if they change the Overseas Minister, because he’s deeply involved in this matter and has carried the Bougival process. If there’s a change and they delegate responsibility for New Caledonia to another minister – well, that’s a game changer.”
Beyond the New Caledonia dossier, France is one of the Forum’s 21 dialogue partners and eager to contribute to debates around climate, oceans and development (many Pacific leaders travelled to Nice last year as France hosted the third UN Ocean Conference).
But France’s resistance to decolonisation in its remaining non-self-governing territories complicates the relationship for many Forum members – especially the four independent Pacific states that are members of the Melanesian Spearhead Group (MSG) alongside the FLNKS. Both Papua New Guinea and Fiji are also members of the United Nations Special Committee on Decolonisation, and have provided diplomatic support for the Kanak people and supporters of independence in Mā’ohi Nui (French Polynesia).
Combined with global uncertainty, conflict and Ukraine and Gaza, China’s economic rise and the vagaries of the Trump administration, the unresolved political crisis in France has sent new shockwaves across the globe. At the Forum retreat hosted by Solomon Islands this week, there’s plenty to be discussed with President Ponga.