NOUMEA, New Caledonia, Jul 25 (IPS) – New Caledonia, a French overseas territory of about 290,000 people in the southwest Pacific, is facing a challenging recovery from weeks of civil unrest that erupted in mid-May, leaving an aftermath of destruction and political turmoil.
A vote by the French Parliament to change the territory’s electoral roll in favor of pro-France loyalists unleashed anger and clashes across the islands between police and pro-independence supporters, most of whom are indigenous Kanaks.
But, at the heart of the political grievances of Kanaks, who comprise about 40 percent of the population, are their experiences over more than a century and a half of entrenched inequality, compared to the non-Kanak population. This includes disparities in educational outcomes and high unemployment.
“Many people do not finish school and don’t have qualifications or diplomas. Many families do not have the money and cannot afford to send their children to school,” Stelios, a young Kanak father who lives in the capital, Noumea, told IPS. “Although within families, people help to support each other.”
New Caledonia, which has large nickel reserves, has a robust economy with a gross domestic product (GDP) of USD 9.62 billion in 2022, compared to USD 1.06 billion in neighboring Vanuatu and USD 4.9 billion in Fiji. But there is a substantial gap in incomes and standards of living between the indigenous and long-term non-Kanak settlers. Poverty and unemployment are major issues for Kanaks who live in remote rural communities and informal urban settlements on the outskirts of the capital, Noumea. While the overall poverty rate is 19.1 percent in New Caledonia, it rises to 45.8 percent in the Loyalty Islands Province, where most of the residents are Kanaks.
Eddie Wayuone Wadrawane, an Associate Lecturer and educational sciences expert at the University of New Caledonia, reports that there is a direct connection between the educational gap for Kanaks and their challenges to finding secure employment. While the unemployment rate for people under the age of 30 in the territory is 28.3 percent, the rate rises to 41.3 percent for those without a qualifying degree.
Kanaks, the indigenous islanders, have lived under some form of French governance since the mid-nineteenth century, when the islands became a colony. After World War II, New Caledonia was granted the status of an ‘overseas territory’ with greater recognition of citizenship and indigenous rights.
But a long history of poverty, loss of land to colonial authorities, forced removal onto reservations and marginalization from political participation triggered numerous Kanak uprisings over decades, culminating in a major outbreak of conflict with French authorities in the 1980s. The negotiations that followed the hostilities led to two agreements between the French Government and local leaders. The Matignon Accord in 1988 and Noumea Accord, signed in 1998, pledged, among other provisions, to address the socioeconomic disparities for the Kanak population, such as lack of access to education, and lack of consultation in governance and political processes.
Public services and economic opportunities are concentrated in the South Province, which includes the capital, Noumea. But there have been gains during the last twenty years with government efforts to improve infrastructure and access to services, such as education, in the more undeveloped North and Loyalty Islands Provinces, where the majority of Kanaks live. The number of Kanak graduates from universities and similar tertiary institutions rose from 99 in 1989 to 3,200 in 2014. But significant disparities remain and it is reported that only 8 percent of Kanaks possessed a university degree in 2019.
“A major part of the philosophy of the Matignon and Noumea Accords was the notion that New Caledonia was not ready for independence because there were no Kanak people in middle or high-level management or in the professions,” Dr David Small, Senior Lecturer at Above the Bar School of Educational Studies and Leadership at New Zealand’s University of Canterbury, told IPS.
But the French education system “is highly selective and there are so many ways that Kanak people can slip out of it. Kanak people are also attuned to and highly critical of the colonial nature of education in New Caledonia,” he continued.
During the Pro-Independence protests in May across New Caledonia against the French Government’s electoral reforms in the territory, a large proportion of people demonstrating on the streets were youths aged 15–25 years. They were venting anger not just at the electoral changes but at the hardships and inequalities that have marked their lives. Patience among the younger generation is running out and they are no longer willing to wait indefinitely for the promises of better lives and opportunities to become a reality.
‘Schooling can play a major role to give those youth new perspectives and bring about societal reforms in general,’ Wadrawane claims. Yet, Dr Small says that many Kanak youths are losing faith in the idea of New Caledonian society being a meritocracy and, hence, also the ability of education to enable success and achievement in employment and life.
But Stelios is one of those who persisted at school and completed secondary education, receiving the Baccalaureate certificate.
“And I have a job. I work at a school, assisting staff,” he said. He is also the father of three young children, all under the age of 7, and is adamant that they will be educated too.
Education experts, such as Wadrawane, advocate that further retaining indigenous students in the education system also requires incorporating Kanak culture and languages into the curricula.
“At present, the curricula appeal more to students from metropolitan France and less so for those from the French overseas territories,” Wadrawane writes. He believes that “greater cultural awareness of youth in primary and secondary education is a philosophical, social and educational necessity” to reducing inequalities and enhancing their citizenship.
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