{"id":698572,"date":"2022-06-13T23:32:42","date_gmt":"2022-06-13T23:32:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/asiapacificreport.nz\/?p=75211"},"modified":"2022-06-13T23:32:42","modified_gmt":"2022-06-13T23:32:42","slug":"rival-new-caledonian-sides-left-in-run-for-french-national-assembly-seats","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/2022\/06\/13\/rival-new-caledonian-sides-left-in-run-for-french-national-assembly-seats\/","title":{"rendered":"Rival New Caledonian sides left in run for French National Assembly seats"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.rnz.co.nz\/international\/pacific-news\/\"><em>RNZ Pacific<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n<p>New Caledonia&#8217;s first round of the French National Assembly election has seen surprise advances of the pro-independence Kanak and Socialist National Liberation Front (FLNKS) whose two candidates both made it to next Sunday&#8217;s run-off round.<\/p>\n<p>Wali Wahetra came second in the constituency made up of the anti-independence stronghold Noumea plus the mainly Kanak Loyalty Islands and the Isle of Pines.<\/p>\n<p>Her success marks the first time in 15 years that an FLNKS candidate has qualified for the second round there.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/news\/2022\/6\/12\/polls-open-in-french-parliamentary-election-amid-left-surge\"><strong>READ MORE:<\/strong> Macron&#8217;s centrists neck-and-neck with Socialists-Green bloc in French elections<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/asiapacificreport.nz\/?s=New+Caledonian+elections\">Other New Caledonian election reports<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&#8220;The goal was attained for the first round&#8221;, she said and thanked &#8220;those who think our struggle is legitimate and noble&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>Sunday&#8217;s voting was the first since the referendum on independence from France in December when the FLNKS boycotted the event, which then saw 96 percent vote against independence.<\/p>\n<p>The election was open to all French citizens in New Caledonia, in contrast to the referendum, for which the roll was restricted to indigenous people and long-term residents.<\/p>\n<p>Turnout was 33 percent, which was a one-percent drop over the previous National Assembly election in 2017.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Lift in independence vote<\/strong><br \/>\nHowever, there was a slight lift in areas traditionally voting for independence because last time a key FLNKS party, the Caledonian Union, had called for abstaining.<\/p>\n<p>With the joint FLNKS call to go out and vote, Wahetra secured 22 percent of the vote while the winner in the constituency Philippe Dunoyer got 41 percent.<\/p>\n<p>Seeking re-election for another five-year term, Dunoyer stood for a newly formed Ensemble, which is a four-party coalition linked for the purpose of this election to French President Emmanuel Macron.<\/p>\n<p>In the other constituency, encompassing the main island minus Noumea, the anti-independence candidate Nicolas Metzdorf won 34 percent of the vote, a narrow advantage over the FLNKS candidate Gerard Reignier with 33 percent.<\/p>\n<p>Reignier said: &#8220;We gave us a goal of making it to the second round and we made it to the second round&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>Seventeen candidates contested Sunday&#8217;s election, including a former president Thierry Santa of the Rassemblement, which had historically been the key anti-independence party.<\/p>\n<p>He won, however, just 22 percent, clearly distanced by Metzdorf and Reignier.<\/p>\n<p>The Rassemblement&#8217;s other candidate, Virginie Ruffenach, also came third in her southern constituency, winning 14 percent of the vote.<\/p>\n<p>Reacting to her defeat, Ruffenach urged her supporters to back Dunoyer in the run-off to ensure the anti-independence parties keep being represented in Paris.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Single candidate tactic<\/strong><br \/>\nThe success of the FLNKS has in part been explained by its member parties agreeing to run a single candidate in each of the two constituencies.<\/p>\n<p>After shunning the referendum in December, it campaigned for the two seats in the hope of getting a representative elected to the French Assembly to have its quest for sovereignty heard.<\/p>\n<p>The result also confirmed the political divide entrenched for years and largely along geographical and ethnic lines.<\/p>\n<p>The polarisation is such that Reignier won more than 90 percent of votes in the northern electorates known for their pro-independence stance.<\/p>\n<p>The anti-independence camp has been riven for years by varying rivalries but for the National Assembly election, four parties formed the Ensemble group, which Metzdorf considered to be a success.<\/p>\n<p>Metzdorf, who is mayor of La Foa and the leader of Generations NC, joined as did Dunoyer of Caledonia Together Party, which had won both seats in 2017.<\/p>\n<p>In the 2018 provincial election, Caledonia Together was weakened and the party leader, Philippe Gomes, who had held one of the two Paris seats for a decade, did not seek re-election this year.<\/p>\n<p><strong>First round victories hailed<\/strong><br \/>\nSonia Backes, who is the president of the Southern Province and the anti-independence politician representing the French president in New Caledonia, hailed the first-round victories of the Ensemble candidates.<\/p>\n<p>She welcomed the support immediately expressed by the defeated Rassemblement politicians, saying there must be a united &#8220;loyalist&#8221; camp.<\/p>\n<p>Backes added that perhaps the new French overseas minister might visit next week while the law commission of the French Senate will conduct a fact-finding mission in preparation of a new statute for New Caledonia.<\/p>\n<p>Many candidates expressed concern about the low turnout, saying some thought has to be given to finding ways of engaging the public.<\/p>\n<p>With campaigning resuming for next Sunday&#8217;s run-off, the two camps are aware that a large pool of voters could be mobilised on both sides.<\/p>\n<p>The anti-independence side is however poised to bolster the support for its two candidates as the losing contenders in its ranks can add their backing for Dunoyer and Metzdorf.<\/p>\n<p>This leaves scant hope for the FLNKS to win a seat in Paris &#8212; one of 577 on offer.<\/p>\n<p><em>This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.<\/em><\/p>\n\n<p class=\"syndicated-attribution\">This post was originally published on <a href=\"https:\/\/asiapacificreport.nz\/2022\/06\/14\/rival-new-caledonian-sides-left-in-run-for-french-national-assembly-seats\/\">Asia Pacific Report<\/a>. <\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>RNZ Pacific New Caledonia\u2019s first round of the French National Assembly election has seen surprise advances of the pro-independence Kanak and Socialist National Liberation Front (FLNKS) whose two candidates both made it to next Sunday\u2019s run-off round. Wali Wahetra came second in the constituency made up of the anti-independence stronghold Noumea plus the mainly Kanak<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":400,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[50,49973,5,5956,480,40787,49064,5957,7,34327,5955,39949,10917,34867,12,14,368,15],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/698572"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/400"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=698572"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/698572\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":698573,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/698572\/revisions\/698573"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=698572"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=698572"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=698572"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}