First round this Sunday, April 16 of the territorial elections in French Polynesia. Some 209,000 voters are called upon to choose their 57 representatives in the Assembly from seven lists. But only two of them are carried by parties established in the five archipelagos of the territory and have a real chance of winning a majority: that of the outgoing president, the separatist Edouard Fritch, of Tapura, and that of the independence deputy Moetai Brotherson , Tavini. What are the issues ? Sémir Al Wardi, political scientist and lecturer in political science at the University of French Polynesia, answers questions from RFI.
RFI: What is the importance of this local vote for Polynesians ?
This is practically the most important election because Polynesians will vote for the Assembly of French Polynesia, which is the local Parliament, and the elected representatives will then elect the President of the Assembly, then the President of Polynesia . But this president is the keystone of the institutions there, it is he who has the most skills. He is elected for five years, he leads Polynesia with, in hand, two important tools : on the one hand, an autonomy that gives it a lot of economic and social skills ; and on the other hand, there is what is called “ legislative specialty “. This means that the laws of the Republic do not apply, in general, in Polynesia and that the president, the government and the local Assembly make the decisions which normally come under the law in mainland France. Hence the importance of this election. There is also another dimension, namely that the left-right divide does not exist in Polynesia. It is rather an autonomist-independentist divide. And if the separatists win the elections, they will tend to demand either a self-determination referendum or to begin the decolonization of Polynesia. So obviously, this election is also important because the future of Polynesia within the framework of the Republic is at stake.
Why the outcome of the election is particularly uncertain this year ?
We are witnessing a rejection of the power in place, the Tapura, by part of the population, in all social groups. As much before, a power in place had a good chance of being re-elected, as much this time, we are in expectation. We are within the framework of the Republic, which means that if the separatists win, it does not mean that we will go to independence. There should be a referendum on self-determination and the population should want this independence. However, we can say today that the separatists are in the minority in Polynesia, and that if they ever vote in the majority for the separatist party, it is essentially to vote against the current power, but not necessarily for independence. During the Covid crisis, the government in place did not always respect the standards it had enacted, and this is reproached to it by the population. The second reason for rejection stems from a crystallization on the Minister of the Economy, who implemented a social VAT just before the 2022 legislative elections which, according to economists, was not really necessary and who participated in inflation. This is, moreover, one of the elements that led the power in place to lose the legislative elections, since the three elected deputies are separatists. [trois sièges de l’Assemblée nationale française sont dévolus à la Polynésie, NDLR].
What were the main themes on which the debates focused ahead of this election? ?
What is very interesting is that we did not talk about independence at all for several months. The first themes that emerged were the high cost of living, inflation and employment. We were therefore on discussions more of a social and economic order than political. But to the general surprise, about a week ago, the paradigm changed for the separatists since they started talking about independence, recourse to the UN, etc. It’s new and, therefore, it will be interesting for the future, because there are fifteen days between the two rounds. And if the independence party maintains this new theme of independence in the campaign, it may lose votes for the reasons already mentioned. : that is to say that the majority of Polynesians are not for independence. As the separatist leader Oscar Temaru himself said, it is necessary to educate the Polynesian people so that they accept this emancipation, and therefore, we are far from it.
The second round of these territorial elections will take place on April 30. The newly constituted Assembly will then elect the President of Polynesia on May 10.
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