May 27, 2024
Cost of colonisation high for Kanaky
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Māori commentator Shane Te Pou says the Kanak people of New Caledonia don’t want to see their vote diluted like the Māori.
During an 18-hour trip to New Zealand’s closest Pacific neighbour on Friday, French president Emmanuel Macron put on hold a decision by the French assembly to give recent settlers a vote – but he also sent in more police to quell riots in the territory and clear roadblocks.
Mr Te Pou, who first went to the island with a rangatahi delegation during a previous period of unrest in the 1990s, says the French government is unwilling to admit the cost of its 170-year occupation to the Indigenous population.
“They’ve depopulated the Kanak people. They’ve stripped them of their language – it was only 20 years ago where they finally allowed Kanak children to be called by Kanak names and not French names. It’s a deep, dark and recent history of colonialism including paramilitary troops attacking Kanaks. Many leaders have been assassinated. It’s a horrible story,” he says.
Shane Te Pou says the only answer is independence through legitimate negotiations and a legitimate referendum.
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