AT dusk, a small group of residents starts to gather at the public housing towers at Magenta, in Noumea, the capital of New Caledonia.
Supporters of the Front de Libération Nationale Kanak et Socialiste (FLNKS) set up microphones for a community meeting with local residents. With provincial elections looming on 28 June, the Kanaky pour Tous (Kanaky for all) electoral list is looking for votes, especially from young people who normally have little time for politicians.
As the meeting begins in the central plaza, there’s only a small number of older women, rugged up against the biting wind. But as the speeches progress, more and more people drift in to stand around under the trees. Come question time, residents raise a mix of issues: an elderly woman who needs help to re-register on the electoral roll; another raises concerns about the relocation of the domestic airport from Magenta to the international airport more than 50 kilometres away, while a third pointedly questions whether the politicians will be seen again after the elections.
Leading independence activists address the locals, including FLNKS president Christian Tein and president of the Parti Travailliste (Labour Party) Marie-Pierre Goyetche.
But pride of place is given to younger members of the Kanaky pour Tous electoral list, a recognition that many young people are wary of politicians, and more focussed on daily life than the ongoing debate over a new political status for New Caledonia.
Ikee Toutikian, age 33, is a single mother of two young boys. She’s served for two terms on the municipal council of Mont Dore, but it’s the first time she’s joined an electoral list to campaign for the Southern Provincial Assembly.
Toutikian is one of many younger people running for this month’s elections, as political parties seek to mobilise voters who usually abstain from voting.
“There aren’t many young people involved in political life,” Toutikian said. “It’s complicated and you often hear people say they don’t give a damn about politics. I understand their distrust – all too often, young people are described as ‘a problem.’ But our young people aren’t a problem, they’re the solution for our future.
“There are so many things that are decided up there, without us, and so it’s important that they hear our voice,” she said.
“We’ve seen our brothers and sisters die in front of us, and we see police harassment every day. After the insurrection in 2024, it was clear we needed a renewal of the political class. So young people have stepped up, even though we still have our elders on the list – we need their experience and their wisdom. That’s why I’ve joined this list Kanaky pour tous because I believe in my country.”
Electoral competition
In the Southern Province, the FLNKS list is led by Johanito Wamytan, who works as cabinet director for the UC-FLNKS parliamentary group within the Congress of New Caledonia. Now, he’s running for office himself, as a new generation of activists push veteran campaigners to the bottom of the list.
At a time of economic crisis and political fatigue, candidates across the spectrum are focussed on mobilising wavering voters, urging them to turn out on election day. But in the Southern Province, there are 11 competing lists including two major pro-independence coalitions: the FLNKS and the Union nationale pour l’Indépendance (UNI).
The UNI list in the South is led by veteran Kanak leader Louis Mapou, who served as President of New Caledonia between 2021-2025. The two parties in UNI – Palika and UPM – left the main FLNKS independence coalition in 2025 and are running under their own banner (in contrast, the main anti-independence groups Les Loyalistes and Rassemblement les Républicains are running a joint ticket in the North and South).
To win a seat in the Southern Province, an electoral list must obtain at least 6,300 votes – no easy task and the division in the independence camp doesn’t help.
However, Wamytan told Islands Business that there is a large pool of potential voters: “The campaign dynamics are important for us, because the potential number of voters out there is around 30,000. We saw that during the 2020 referendum: the YES vote amounted to nearly 30,000. In 2024, for the elections to the French National Assembly, Emmanuel Tjibaou won more than 20,000 votes. So, there’s a margin to manoeuvre for us, but that’s the challenge – to mobilise the maximum number of voters.”
“Many young people don’t understand how our institutions function nor the significance of this election campaign” Wamytan acknowledged.
“So, another element of our campaign is the renewal of our electoral list, responding to the desire to have more young faces and transform the political class. Finally, there’s our political program, on social justice, the struggle against economic inequality and the creation of solutions for the country’s youth, who until now have been left aside by society.”
Across the country, the FLNKS has chosen leaders in their forties to head their electoral lists: Wamytan (aged 46) in the South; Pascal Sawa (44) in the North; and Mickaël Forrest (46) in the Loyalty Islands. This change hasn’t been without controversy, as the largest party Union Calédonienne negotiated with other FLNKS members over the top positions on the 50-string electoral lists that would guarantee a seat.
Wamytan defends the changes in the FLNKS since New Caledonia’s crisis in 2024: “Some people say that the FLNKS today is not what it once was – and that’s true! But that’s not to say that the FLNKS is weakened, or that it no longer represents the colonised people as a national liberation front. The FLNKS is still recognised locally, regionally, and internationally as a liberation movement.”
Tough economic times
In May 2024, Noumea erupted into violence, as the French government sought to open up the restricted electoral roll for New Caledonia’s three provincial assemblies and National Congress. During six months of conflict, hundreds of Kanaks – especially young people – were detained and charged, public infrastructure and private businesses were damaged or looted, and the economy collapsed. In 2024, GDP fell 13.5 per cent, damaging an economy that was already reeling after the COVID pandemic and the surge in global energy prices after the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Two years on, working people are still suffering the after-effects of that time.
“For many people, their priority today is to eat – the future status of their country is not their primary preoccupation,” Johanito Wamytan said. “Their priority is to put food on the table so their children can salve their hunger, to pay the rent, the electricity bills, the cost of transport. That’s their concern – the cost of a packet of SAO biscuits, or Chinese noodles, a tin of sardines. This is the reality facing many people today and that’s the challenge for our political institutions, to lift the people of New Caledonia out of the hole where they’ve fallen.
“So that’s the focus of our campaign: the province should be there to help people stand up, not as charity but as a safety net to address their situation, while respecting their dignity. If people can’t see economic development, we are creating the conditions for a social explosion.”
“There are a lot of young people who are angry at politicians, for not finding solutions to address their day-to-day concerns” he said. “So, we must explain to them that if you want things to change, you have to change the majority in the Southern Assembly. I say to them, if you don’t vote, you’re actually voting for Sonia Backès,” the current provincial president and head of the anti-independence Loyalists-Rassemblement electoral ticket.
New political statute
These are the first provincial elections in seven years, and many New Caledonians are fatigued by a decade of economic woes and the trauma of the 2024 crisis.
But Wamytan stresses the importance of the poll on June 28, to give a mandate to leaders who must continue a dialogue on a future political status for the French Pacific dependency. In May, the French National Assembly rejected a proposed political statute known as the Bougival Accord, leaving the country at an impasse.
Wamytan noted that “this is the first time we’ve gone to elections without a political agreement – that’s different to 1998, when we signed the Noumea Accord then went to the elections afterwards. Now we’re on a different path, so we need to explain to people how our institutions are governed. If they don’t vote, the current people in power will continue to rule. Beyond this, we need to create the conditions to allow the FLNKS to work towards an ‘Accord de Kanaky,’ that recognises our sovereignty.”
French Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu has proposed a new round of talks in July, to bring together the French State with both supporters and opponents of independence for discussions on a new political statute.
“We’re committed to sitting around the table in July,” Wamytan said. “However, we’ve already warned the French State that the talks must be on a basis agreed by all, as in 1988 and 1998. All of the methods used by the French State since then have created this impasse, highlighted by the example of the Bougival process. There must be an agreed process. There also must be trust, unlike what we saw last year, when Bougival was adopted as a draft, but was suddenly described as a ‘historic agreement’.”
Time is short however to achieve consensus on a new political framework. In May 2027, the French presidential elections will be held, and already candidates are preparing for the contest, from LFI’s Jean-Luc Mélenchon on the Left, to Jordan Bardella and Marine Le Pen of the Rassemblement national on the extreme Right.
Wamytan stressed that “the FLNKS is not fixed on the need to sign an agreement now. Whoever represents the French State, it’s still the French State, whether it’s Emmanuel Macron, Jordan Bardella or Jean-Luc Mélenchon!”
“It’s been 173 years that the actors before us have changed, just as the interlocuters of the Kanak people have changed,” he said. “There’s no need to rush to finalise an agreement. We must take the time to forge a political agreement that satisfies everyone. This is all about the future stability of our country.”
