May 27, 2024
Cost of colonisation high for Kanaky
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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