French gamble on referendum
pp. 23-24 · Read in the full issue
It is described by the French independent daily, ‘Libera tionas a remake of one of France’s favourite TV quiz shows - “Numbers and Letters” are not certain to add up, the newspaper says, referring to New Caledonia’s anti-inde pendence Republican Party, the RPCR, and their stated intention of gaining a participa tion rate of 60% in the forth coming controversial referen dum on independence. The poll, which is due to be held in the territory by August, is likely to be boycotted by the FLNKS and other pro-independence parties (see box).
The outcome is not in doubt up to 99% of votes cast will say ‘yes’ to New Caledonia staying within the French Republic, but this figure is not the most important. “Once the registered electors, the actual voters and the previous scores of the cur-
rent parties are fed into the machine, a figure of less than 50% participation is given for this poll”, Liberation’s Noumea correspondent writes. The re mainder would be made up of habitual abstainers (about
18%), and “independantistes”, who would stay at home. And while Bernard Pons, French Overseas Territories Minister, refrained on his recent visit to New Caledonia from citing the participation rate that he would
consider a victory, some RPCR members were too quick in setting the rate at 60%, Libera tion said. The referendum was too important, said the report, to be abandoned by the French government. It had been de manded repeatedly by the RPCR and the extreme right National Front to ‘make the situation clear at last”, and was also seen by the right as a means of preventing President Mitterrand, if re-elected in 1988, from questioning a clear score in favour of the territory remaining French. In any case, the paper added, the Noumea administration admitted that the government has gone too far to turn back: “the decision was taken very quickly and it was only later that we did our sums now we must scrape another 10% and time counts. “A first option could be to reduce the number of enrolled voters (a solution used by the Roynette
Kanak leader Nidoish Naisseline.
administration in Noumea in 1984 to produce a 50% plus participation rate after the successful FLNKS boycott and disruption), and the newspaper noted that the Noumea Town Council has applied to the courts to have removed from the rolls some 5,661 voters who have not participated in the last three elections. ”If granted, this application will put another 2% in the loyalist purse”.A second option was to increase the number of voters - by campaigning to get habitual abstainers to the poll, as well as the smaller, more moderate Kanak independence parties, the LKS and the OPAO ( who took part in the 1984 elections). Their participation, and especially the fact they would vote ‘no’ to remaining in the French Repub-
lie, would give the French gov emment a true referendum with a ‘for’ and an ‘against’, Moreover, Liberation writes, the LKS and OPAO would not total more than 7 to 8% of ‘no’ votes. But, Liberation’s cor respondent says, the FLNKS set out several months ago to charm the LKS, and LKS lead er Nidoish Naisseline, who wants the referendum held after the 1988 Presidential elections, has said his party will also boycott if the French parliament adopts the electoral body called for by the RPCR. “The govern ment is thus left with little room to manoeuvre in scraping an extra 10% and this referendum which according to the RPCR should be a royal avenue to a better future, could prove to be cul-de- sac”