PACIFIC ISLANDS REPORT

Pacific Islands Development Program/East-West Center
With Support From Center for Pacific Islands Studies/University of Hawai‘i

By Al Prince

PAPEÉTE, Tahiti (Tahitipresse, Feb. 8, 2009) - French Polynesia has no president and no government for the first time ever, and, no one is certain how long this will last and how it will end. This extended political crisis could all be over on Wednesday, in 15 days or some five months from now in a worst-case scenario.

Gaston Tong Sang’s resignation as French Polynesia president on Saturday along with his remaining 10 cabinet ministers has created an unprecedented political situation in Tahiti’s modern pro-autonomy period that began in 1984.

The situation, which is also confusing if not complicated, has sent legal specialists, lawyers and perhaps even a few judges searching for a pathfinder solution that is not clearly provided in French Polynesia’s February 2004 organic law adopted by the French Parliament.

The final legal arbiter may well end up being the Conseil d’Etat in Paris, France’s Supreme Court for administrative justice. But despite whatever legal solution is decided, the final solution may well rest in the hands of Tahiti’s three main political leaders.

One of those leaders is Oscar Temaru, 64, the Tavini Huiraatira pro-Tahiti independence political party leader, head of the Union for Democracy (UPLD) coalition, co-leader of the opposition’s Union for Development, Stability and Peace (USDP) coalition and French Polynesia Assembly speaker. He undoubtedly sees himself as only three days away from becoming president of this French overseas collectivity (2007 pop. 259,706) for the fourth time since 2004.

Another is Gaston Flosse, 77, the doyen of Tahitian politicians, one of Tahiti’s two members of the French Senate, leader of the pro-France, pro-Tahiti autonomy Tahoera’a Huiraatira party, co-leader of the UDSP opposition coalition in the 57-representative French Polynesia Assembly. He undoubtedly sees this as perhaps his last attempt to have the political spotlight that so dominated most of his early political career from 1965 to 2004.

Finally, there is Tong Sang, 59, the just-resigned Tahiti president, the leader of the pro-France, pro-autonomy To Tatou Ai’a coalition of small parties and the mayor of Bora Bora in the Leeward Islands. He is obviously counting on the backing of the Sarkozy government in Paris to pull off the biggest political coup in Tahiti’s history.

Reduced to sitting on the sidelines after having stirred up the brewing political pot is Jean-Christophe Bouissou, 48, the leader of the small pro-France, pro-autonomy Rautahui party. He may end up regretting his anxious attempt to force a compromise solution that backfired; taking him from the Tong Sang government’s floor leader in the assembly to a spectator role with his party’s two other assembly representatives as Temaru, Flosse and Tong Sang decide Tahiti’s future.

There are basically three possible plans facing Tahiti’s politicians.

Plan A involves the French Polynesia Assembly voting Wednesday on the motion of no confidence filed last Wednesday by an expanded opposition seeking to topple the nine-month-old Tong Sang government. The motion names pro-independence party leader and Assembly Speaker Oscar Temaru as candidate to replace Tong Sang as president.

The Temaru-Flosse-Bouissou coalition is claiming a 31-vote absolute majority in the assembly. That would be the biggest majority any of the previous seven coalition governments has had since 2004. Each of those governments has had only a 29-vote absolute majority.

Plan B involves the French Polynesia Assembly choosing a new president of Tahiti within 15 days, with the field wide open as to the number of candidates -- Temaru, Tong Sang and maybe even Flosse.

Plan C involves modifying French Polynesia’s French Parliament-approved organic law and the holding of new elections for the French Polynesia Assembly’s 57 seats. This is a process that could take an estimated three months for modifying the organic law and two months for campaigning and the staging of two rounds of assembly elections.

Unfortunately, politics in Tahiti is not as simple and expedient as choosing among three possible plans. Instead, Tahiti is faced with the likelihood of a very heated political debate that most likely will go to the Papeéte Administrative Tribunal and then on to the Conseil d’Etat in Paris.

While such a legal battle continues, French Polynesia’s current economic crisis, stemming from its increased political instability as well as the direct and indirect effects of the global financial crisis, could only worsen.

Already a huge political debate has begun over whether the no confidence motion even exists now that the Tong Sang government has resigned. Immediately coming to Tong Sang’s defense, French Overseas State Secretary Yves Jégo stepped into the middle of the debate by announcing Saturday that the Tong Sang government’s resignation en masse has, in effect, nullified the no confidence motion.

While Flosse went off to the Tuamotu atoll of Fakarava away from the news media, his party’s top vice president, Edouard Fritch, said the no confidence motion is still valid. The Tong Sang government’s resignation, according to Fritch, was an attempt to stop the political hemorrhaging, which had already produced the resignation of five cabinet ministers between last Wednesday and Friday. Fritch is the candidate to succeed Temaru as assembly speaker.

That left Tong Sang and Bouissou to exchange opposing views on what lies ahead as well as the legality of the no confidence motion. But Tong Sang immediately went to his home on Bora Bora, the only one of French Polynesia’s islands more famous than Tahiti.

For Bouissou, the Tong Sang government’s resignation was anticipated, but has no bearing on the no confidence motion and Wednesday’s scheduled vote on Temaru’s candidacy as Tahiti’s next president.

Before leaving for Bora Bora, Tong Sang sent a letter to French President Nicolas Sarkozy asking for the French government to revise the 2004 organic law spelling out how French Polynesia is to be governed and what it’s relationship is with France as an overseas collectivity.

Specifically, what Tong Sang wants, as quickly as possible, is for the French Parliament to change once again the voting procedure in French Polynesia. The aim, Tong Sang wrote, is to create "a true majority" for "calmly" running Tahiti’s government.

"The continued instability plaguing (French) Polynesia for nearly five years is once again hitting the ‘country,’ the former president wrote. "It seems to me necessary to review the organic law amended to the French Polynesia statute," he added.

Although Tong Sang did not spell out what electoral law reforms he wants France to include in the organic law, it may mean he is seeking a return of the majority bonus.

Originally introduced by Flosse, this involves a bonus of 13 assembly seats going to the list of candidates obtaining the most votes in an election for the assembly’s seats. But the bonus backfired for Flosse the first time it was applied in 2004, helping Temaru, instead, and helped Temaru again in 2005 during an election for the 37 Windward Islands seats.

The majority bonus theoretically favors big political parties and makes it difficult, if not impossible, for small political parties to win a seat in the assembly.

Another possible revision would be converting the existing six electoral voting districts into only on big voting district.

Tong Sang’s letter called for all political parties, including those not represented in the assembly, to meet and modify the change in the voting system "to give the ‘country’ a representative and stable majority." He called on President Sarkozy to "rapidly implement this process . . . so that the ‘country’ can find a calmer political and social life."

In a second letter, Tong Sang called on Assembly Speaker Temaru to accept the Tong Sang government’s resignation and to immediately inform French High Commissioner Adolphe Colrat.

Meanwhile, the leader of a pro-autonomy party in the Marquesas Islands called on Friday for new French Polynesia Assembly elections and the designation of the northernmost archipelago as a separate French overseas collectivity. That means separate from French Polynesia, which is also a French overseas collectivity.

Tahitipresse: www.tahitipresse.pf
Copyright © 2008 Tahitipresse. All Rights Reserved