The text continues its legislative route. The constitutional text providing for “a status of autonomy” for Corsica “within the Republic” was adopted by a large majority, this Wednesday March 27, by the Corsican Assembly, 13 elected officials out of 63 however voting against it. granting of local normative power.
The text, composed of six paragraphs, was submitted to a vote in three parts, on the notion of Corsican community, the possibility of normative power granted to island elected officials, and finally the idea of submitting this text to Corsican voters via a popular consultation.
The first part, paragraph 1, was approved by 62 elected officials out of 63 with one vote against. It provides for “the recognition of an autonomous status for Corsica within the Republic which takes into account its own interests linked to its Mediterranean insularity, to its historical, linguistic and cultural community having developed a singular link to its land” . The third part, paragraph 6, considering validation of this text by a popular consultation of Corsican voters, without a specific date, was also approved by 62 elected officials out of 63 with one vote against.
The part on the normative power that could be granted to Corsican elected officials, corresponding to paragraphs 2 to 5 of the text, obtained 49 votes for, 13 against and one abstention. A fourth vote finally confirmed, by 62 votes for and one against, that “the text thus adopted be transmitted to parliament”.
Envious of Guyana, Alsace, the Basque Country and Brittany, this text is the one on which the Minister of the Interior, Gérald Darmanin, and eight Corsican elected officials representing the different political tendencies of the island hemicycle had agreed mid-March in Paris.
Powerful democratic moment
After the debates and before the votes, the autonomist president of the executive council of Corsica Gilles Simeoni assured that an “extremely powerful and strong democratic moment” had been experienced, judging that this consultation of elected island officials was “a tremendous message of hope “, even if she “keeps quiet about our disagreements”.
The co-president of the right-wing Un Soffiu Novu group, Jean-Martin Mondoloni, explained why he and part of his group did not wish to approve this text in its entirety, “the heart of (s)a divergence” being “the legislative power ” considered.
“You consider that there is no autonomy without legislative power”, he said to Gilles Simeoni and “you aim to exercise all legislative powers, except the sovereign”, which means “social security, pensions, national education…”, he recalled. But “I don’t want these skills to be managed by the Corsican Assembly, I don’t want to go that far.” “Yes or no, here and in Paris, are there people who can hear that we do not want to be part of this epic? That we do not want to participate in the film of which you are presenting this evening the tape -announcement?”, he insisted, pleading for “reasonable autonomy”.
The co-president of the right-wing group Valérie Bozzi, for her part, indicated “vote for this text”, refusing to “take the risk of being the one who will cause the process to fail”: “Let’s give ourselves the means to exert all our strength rather than to exclude ourselves,” she added. On the side of the separatists, the only elected representative of the Nazione party, Josepha Giacometti, declared that she was voting “against this deliberation”, which she sees as “a barrier and not a decisive step”, believing that we are “preparing to register which is not essential in the stone of the Constitution.”
The 32 elected officials from the autonomist party of Gilles Simeoni, the seven elected autonomist opposition Avanzemu and the six independentist elected officials from Core in Fronte approved the four votes of the evening.
“Seek broad consensus”
Gérald Darmanin had called on Gilles Simeoni to “seek a broad consensus” within “the Territorial Assembly, beyond the Corsican autonomist and nationalist family”.
If this Corsican step is considered to have been reached by President Macron, those of the national Parliament will remain, where the project is far from unanimous. The right, a majority in the Senate, is hostile to this constitutional reform which, to be validated, will have to be voted on identically by the National Assembly and the upper house before the meeting of deputies and senators in Congress, where a majority of the three fifths will be required.
Discussions on a form of autonomy for the Isle of Beauty were launched after weeks of violence on the island in 2022, following the death of independence activist Yvan Colonna, attacked in prison where he was serving a life sentence for the assassination in 1998 of the prefect of Corsica Claude Erignac.