Delphine Mayeur / AFP
Independence Christian Tein said he was personally unfavorable to the Bougival agreement.
New Caledonia – The activist does not mince words. On a visit to Corsica Tuesday, July 29, the president of the National Liberation Front Kanak and Socialist (FLNKS) Christian Tein expressed in interviews given to AFP and here (ex-France Bleu) his strong reluctance about the Bougival agreement on the future of New Caledonia signed on July 12 by several loyalist and independence leaders.
“Individually, I am against this agreement because it does not meet our expectations, (…) I think that we are too far from the path already traveled”he told AFP, on the sidelines of a press conference organized in Bastia by the independence party Corse Nazione, in which he participated.
The agreement had been signed in the Paris region at the end of ten days of closed discussions, in particular by the delegation of the FLNKS which, back in New Caledonia, assured that it was initiating only one “Project of agreement”.
The Caledonian Union (UC), one of the main independentist components of the FLNKS, of which Christian Tein is also one of the executives, had also criticized in a press release on July 21 the compromise text, deploring that the “Fundamentals of the fight of the Kanak people do not appear there”.
A pressure « terrible »
“The pressure that was exerted on each other during this period of discussion, it was terrible”said Tuesday Christian Tein, under judicial supervision after being in pre-trial detention a year as part of the survey on riots which left 14 dead and two billion euros in damage in New Caledonia in 2024.
“It is a process that was too forced by state representatives. It gives a lot of capital gains to the right of the country ”, He also declared to here. “Today, you have the impression that it is the state and the right people who will decide on the future of the Kanak people”he added.
Christian Tein defended the Noumea agreement, signed in 1998, which had established progressive autonomy for New Caledonia and which constituted “A leap forward”while that of Bougival “Is almost a step back (…) for the Kanak people”he said.
Questioned by AFP on whether the agreement is proposed to create a “Caledonian state” et “A Caledonian nationality” was an advance, he replied: “For me, the approach is biased from the start because the state is still in it, it is a small nation in a large nation and we, we have not fought, we did not engage in the reflection for the construction of our country in this approach. »»
A FLNKS congress to stop a final position of all independentist movements on the Bougival agreement was scheduled for August 2 but “Could be shifted” has “Next week”according to Christian Tein who plans to participate in videoconference, being forbidden to go to New Caledonia. “We must try to seek full sovereignty (…) But we see that in the draft agreement, we are far from the account”he added. With here, he affirms that the agreement “Risk of being rejected in block by the Kanaks”.
