On the final day of the Pacific Islands Forum mission to New Caledonia, the delegation of Forum leaders broke bread with church and community elders at a working breakfast.
Fiji Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka thanked the hosts for their welcome, in the presence of senior church leaders like the Catholic Archbishop of Noumea, Monsignor Michel Calvet, and Pastor Höcë Léonard Var Kaemo, president of the Église Protestante de Kanaky Nouvelle-Calédonie (the main Protestant denomination in New Caledonia).
They were joined by members of the ‘Comité Parole, Mémoire, Vérité, Réconciliation’ (PMVR – a committee established in 2021 that links community and religious leaders to reflect on history, memory, truth and reconciliation in New Caledonia).
After the dialogue with Forum leaders, Islands Business spoke with some participants about the meeting.
Jean-Pierre Taïeb Aïfa is a veteran political and community leader – a descendant of the Algerian rebels deported to New Caledonia after an 1871 revolt against French colonialism in north Africa. Serving for thirty years as mayor of the rural town of Bourail until his retirement, Aïfa has continued to work as an elder to promote dialogue and reconciliation, as a member of the Comité des Sages (Committee of Elders) and now the PMVR.
Aïfa told Islands Business that he welcomed the opportunity to share church and community perspectives with the Forum delegation.
“I think that they listened attentively to everything that was said, because we could say the truth, and nothing but the truth,” he said. “The political world here tends to tell lies to the New Caledonian population. I think the work that’s being done by civil society today is much more important than the work being done by the political parties. Civil society has the capacity to come together, however diverse and varied our opinions.”
“The countries are the Forum are countries of the Pacific,” Aïfa added. “We are all Pacific islanders, even if New Caledonia is French. We’re in Oceania, not the Hexagon [metropolitan France]. We are not Europeans – we are of Oceania. It’s important to take onto account that the majority of the population here share a Pacific culture. When Paris understands this, then things might change.”
Voices from below
Pastor Höcë Var Kaemo of the EPKNC said: “We’re not alone in the Pacific – we’re are part of the Pacific nation; we have Pacific values and together we defend those values.”
Kaemo also welcomed the opportunity to meet with Forum leaders, stressing that the voices of churches and community organisations often went unheard.
“I think that our politicians should pay more attention to people in the community – I don’t think they listen to us enough,” he said. “They’re always deciding things from on high, so it’s important that from time to time they listen to the population. Many important ideas don’t come from on high, they come from the grassroots. We have sounded the alarm to our leaders – from time to time you should come to our level to talk, because we have some things to say.”
Since mid-July, there have been arson attacks on a number of Catholic churches and a presbytery, including historic churches such as Saint-Denis de Balade at Pouebo and Saint Louis church on the outskirts of Noumea.
Jean-Pierre Aïfa noted: “The religious community has some difficulties, as there have been protest actions by the youth, who have burnt some churches. I don’t understand that, I don’t support that, and I’m scared of that. I think we have to find new ways of dealing with the underlying problems.”
For the churches, developing a common vision between generations remains an ongoing task, even for the EPKNC membership which supports independence from France.
In June this year, just weeks after the start of riots and clashes in New Caledonia, the church used its prophetic voice to speak to leaders in Paris about government policies that threatened community harmony. The EPKNC wrote an open letter to French President Emmanuel Macron, calling on him to abandon a proposed constitutional amendment on voting rights – the immediate trigger that sparked the crisis on 13 May.
In the open letter to President Macron, Pastor Kaemo wrote: “If anyone should help us roll away the tombstone, which currently prevents all possible resurrections, it is indeed you, M. President of the Republic. Do not be afraid to step back from this legislative process that you have initiated, which has created fear, resistance and despair for the children of God in Kanaky New Caledonia.”
After months of ambiguity from Paris about the fate of President Macron’s legislation, it was formally withdrawn on 1 October by incoming French Prime Minister Michel Barnier.
The church leader welcomed this week’s visit by Forum leaders, reinforcing the regional ties developed when the EPKNC hosted the 12th General Assembly of the Pacific Conference of Churches (PCC) in Noumea in November 2023 – the first time in 57 years the PCC assembled in the country that hosted its first meeting in 1966.
For Pastor Kaemo, these opportunities to share ideas with the broader Pacific is all too rare: “You know, in each country in the Pacific, we are each living in our own place. But sometimes we need a spokesperson, a microphone, to share our ideas with others.”
He noted that “the ecumenical movement of churches across the Pacific plays an important role in sharing our thoughts – carrying our voice from this little island, so that it resonates at the United Nations or other institutions. That’s why we have a need for structures that bring us together across the Pacific, to say the things that are important for us.”
Learning from history
Politicians, church and community elders have met with Forum leaders during their three-day visit, but there have also been opportunities for younger generations to have a say: at a lunch for young people; a meeting with representatives of women’s groups; and discussions with teachers and education authorities.
Clara Filippi is a young New Caledonian woman involved in work on reconciliation, the transmission of history and New Caledonia’s collective memory. A descendant of Algerian deportees and Italian migrants, she thinks that sharing a common understanding of New Caledonia’s colonial past is the way to build the future.
Filippi joined the working breakfast with Forum leaders on Tuesday, and told Islands Business that “it was important to develop the discussion with other countries that are Forum members, because discussions here in New Caledonia haven’t come to an end yet.”
“I think that the meeting with the Pacific Islands Forum allows us to consider views from a different perspective from neighbouring countries, our brother countries, that will allow us to develop a wider vision”, she said.
With her focus on peacebuilding and peacemaking, Filippi says that “we can learn from the experience from other Pacific countries that have gone through such times as we have recently. In our meeting with the Forum, we raised the challenge of New Caledonian history, and how we’ve talked about the destin commun [shared destiny].”
“I think we must look to our past,” she said, “and to do the work that’s needed so that together, we can address the problems that stop us coming together.”