A-Infos (en) France, UCL AL #373 - International - Kanaky: Repression by the Colonial State Continues (ca, de, fr, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

Two years after the popular uprisings that led to particularly violent 
repression, the situation in Kanaky is worsening. Poverty is on the 
rise, and public services have virtually disappeared in some areas. 
While settlers receive aid from the administration, those who suffer 
most are, of course, the Kanak people. A look back at a territory that 
remains a French colony today.
Two years after the popular uprisings that led to particularly violent 
repression, the situation in Kanaky is worsening. Poverty is on the 
rise, and public services have virtually disappeared in some areas. 
While settlers receive aid from the administration, those who suffer 
most are, of course, the Kanak people. A look back at a territory that 
remains a French colony today[1].

Administratively, Kanaky is divided into three provinces: the South, the 
North, and the Loyalty Islands. In 2025, the country had 264,596 
inhabitants. Three-quarters live in the South Province, and half of the 
Kanak population now resides in Greater Nouméa, where approximately 70% 
of economic activity is concentrated. Overall, 25% of the population 
lives below the poverty line. Most of these are Kanaks or Pacific 
Islanders. Around 10,000 people live in precarious housing in Nouméa and 
its surrounding area. The standard of living for Kanaks is half that of 
non-Kanaks. Among them, 30% of young people are unemployed. And only 8% 
of higher education graduates are Kanak. Furthermore, they face 
discrimination in education, employment, housing, and leisure activities.

For two years, precariousness and poverty have been worsening.
The pro-independence Kanak Workers' Union (USTKE), which supported the 
uprising of spring 2024, has been constantly warning about its 
consequences linked to the colonial management of events. Since May 13, 
2024, the date of the Kanak youth uprising, unemployment has risen 
sharply. The destruction of businesses has had major economic and social 
consequences, primarily around Nouméa. Seven hundred businesses (shops, 
industries, services) have been burned down or severely damaged. 
Thousands of jobs have been lost, and working-class neighborhoods have 
lost their local shops, schools, health centers, and transportation. In 
the private sector, more than one in six employees has lost their job.

A large part of Nouméa's Kanak population lives in informal settlements 
and squats.

Credits: LINDEPENDANT-KNC
Inequalities, already very pronounced, have worsened. Food insecurity is 
increasing sharply. Food prices (already much higher than in mainland 
France, as 85% of products are imported) have risen by 6.7% since the 
beginning of 2024; this is eroding purchasing power and particularly 
disproportionately impacting the poorest households, who spend 28% of 
their budget on food. According to the New Caledonia Food Bank, an 
additional 20,000 people need assistance with food, on top of the 10,000 
beneficiaries already identified. At the end of 2024, the USTKE (Union 
of Trade Unions of Keitas) established a food bank[2]to help workers who 
have lost their jobs and find themselves, along with their families, in 
dire straits. It remains a current issue and is the result of the 
colonial ambitions of the French state and its supporters, who sought to 
impose a change to the electoral roll, in defiance of the decolonization 
agreements.

Abandoned Public Services
After May 13, 2024, the bus network was virtually at a standstill, 
leaving the population practically without public transportation. Some 
lines were gradually restored, but with very limited schedules and a bus 
ticket costing 500 CFP (4 euros), an exorbitant expense for a portion of 
the local population. The May 2024 uprisings also led to the departure 
of a large number of healthcare workers. This phenomenon particularly 
affected areas already under strain, especially in the north of the 
island, where just a few departures were enough to tip the scales in a 
region that was already a near-medical desert. There are 118 closed beds 
at the Greater Nouméa Territorial Hospital Center, 70 out of 172 in 
private clinics, and 40 out of 60 in the North Province's main hospital. 
More than half of the territory's operating theaters are out of service. 
Nursing homes and community health centers are under constant strain, 
and several healthcare facilities have had to close.

Greater Nouméa Territorial Hospital Center. The majority of the 
population only has access to clinics.

Credits: CHT
On June 5, 2024, the president of the Southern Province, and former 
Secretary of State, Sonia Backès, declared, addressing "those who 
burned, looted, and blockaded New Caledonia, and those who continue to 
do so," that "the province will cut off all the aid they receive." 
Discriminatory measures targeting Kanaks were thus implemented. 
Reimbursement for medical assistance was suspended in July 2024, "until 
further notice," except in certain cases. A ten-year residency 
requirement in the Southern Province was also established for applying 
for school or university scholarships and public rental housing[3]; this 
effectively excludes many young Kanaks. In addition, children are being 
refused enrollment in school, the cafeteria, or after-school programs. A 
plan for budgetary, social, and fiscal reforms was adopted in August 
2025; It includes a reduction in family allowances, thus exacerbating 
the difficulties faced by the most vulnerable households.

These various measures have particularly affected the Kanak population. 
This additional social injustice is a form of collective punishment 
following the popular uprising of May 2024. Conversely, the precarious 
state of public finances did not prevent the Southern Province from 
implementing, as early as December of that same year, a plan aimed at 
encouraging the return of settlers who left after May 2024, through 
subsidies for airfare[4]and the allocation of more than 2 billion 
CFP[5]to very small businesses, under the pretext of supporting these 
companies, which are mostly run by non-Kanaks.

Christian Mahieux (UCL South-East Suburbs)

Submit

[1]The data in this article comes from work submitted by the USTKE and 
published by the national collective Solidarité Kanaky, of which UCL is 
a member. This text was written in mid-June and therefore does not 
address the provincial elections of the 28th; we will certainly return 
to this topic in the fall, providing an opportunity to analyze the power 
dynamics between pro-independence supporters and those who support 
French New Caledonia, as well as between the various pro-independence 
movements, and the state of solidarity within France.

[2]From France, everyone can contribute directly; ensuring that activist 
groups, particularly trade unions, participate is an example of what 
internationalist solidarity can look like in practice.

[3]On June 10, 2025, the ten-year residency requirement in the South 
Province was suspended by the judge of the summary proceedings division 
of the Administrative Court of New Caledonia. Furthermore, on January 
29, 2026, the National Consultative Commission on Human Rights (CNCDH) 
published a report highlighting the "violent, often disproportionate, 
repression by law enforcement[...]and more specifically against the 
Kanak people." It indicates that the repressive measures have 
"particularly affected the Kanak population" and have been perceived "as 
a social injustice and a punishment for past violence."

[4]Conversely, Kanak prisoners deported to France must rely on public 
assistance to finance their return home.

[5]Two billion Pacific francs represent approximately 17 million euros.

https://www.unioncommunistelibertaire.org/?Kanaky-La-repression-de-l-Etat-colonial-se-poursuit
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