The political scientist Charles Zorgbibe, in L’Année internationale (1990), (International year) exclaimed: « who is going to ensure the survival of the micro-States of the Pacific? » (Those that are mainly situated in the South of the Tropic of Cancer, this region of the world that one calls Oceania). Ten years later, their situation proved to be terrible.
The intertropical Pacific Island suffered from serious problems that the world seemed to ignore. This part of the Pacific is not the « new centre of the world » (see map), quite the reverse. The globalization rather forgot about it (what interest such weak figures of population held, were these countries worth the detour that the big commercial establishments took?) and it became victim of the end of the Cold War (the big Donor States turning their attention towards other regions of the world, Australia towards Asia, European Union towards the old communist countries). Some States and Territories were in the grips of civil wars (covering ethnic conflicts like in the Salomon Islands or in the Bougainville Island coming under the Papua New Guinea). They were confronted with a chronic political instability (like in Vanuatu, Nauru and Fidji). The working class population was victim of corruption that reigned among the elite. These islands had become refuges of « dirty money». The Forum du Pacifique, a very political organization of the countries of the region, confirmed it in August 2001: “There are clear proofs that a transnational crime is heading towards our region”. Even though this region got the biggest help for the development of the planet, poverty spread. A sizeable emigration – given the levels of population – emptied several of them. For example, 17 000 people from Wallis Island, and Futuna Island immigrated to New Caledonia (their islands of origin have about 15 000 inhabitants). The Western Samoa Islands have about 179 000 inhabitants, but 60 000 Samoans live in the United-States, 85 000 in New Zealand, 8 000 in Australia and 15 000 in the American Samoa. Since a few years, the health questions are becoming cause for worry in some places, such as the disturbing development of AIDS in Fidji and in Papua New Guinea for example. The very existence of the countries with only atolls is threatened by the rising waters and the violence of the cyclones. Is democracy possible when the basis of human relations is the custom or gift and counter-gift?
The big riparian nations, Australia and New Zealand considered that they did not have the means to ensure order on these vast stretches, nor to continue to give financial aid to countries that used this public aid so badly. There, as elsewhere, the 11th September 2001 changed the data. Could the super powers neglect this zone of instability? Moreover, Australia has harshly felt the assassination attempt of Bali of the 12th October 2002 which aimed mainly its nationals. It completely adapted to meet the new circumstances and, John Howard, Conservatory Prime Minister – easily re-elected in October 2004 – undoubtedly encouraged by the American Ally, decided to put some order. In the Salomon islands, a task force directed by Australia ended the exactions of the militia. At Fidji, the police is from then onwards directed by an Australian and several Military or Judicial Counselors are of the same nationality.
Australia has also decided to intervene in Papua New Guinea to restore the order threatened by criminality, corruption and political instability. The Papuan government has not accepted what it considered as interference in the maintenance of order, finances, fiscality, justice, with Australia deploying around tens of experts and hundred and sixty police officers. A diplomatic crisis broke out between the two countries. It is in the process of being resolved since the end of August 2005.
At Nauru, the Australian intervention was carried out in the form of sending experts entrusted with preparing big financial reforms since its resources in phosphates and the fiscal paradise were on the point of disappearing.
Australia has also placed (15th August 2003) an Australian at the head of the Forum of the Pacific islands. John Howard – imitating George Bush – is trying to impose « the good governance » in the Pacific. Before the Federal Parliament, on 12th August 2003, John Howard answered the accusations of « neocolonialism”: « we have countries which, if we do nothing, are on the brinks of chaos ». On a short trip to Salomon, end of December 2003, he went further still:
[This part of the world is] our terrain, it is our corner of the world […] If we were not ready to help our friends in need, nobody else would do it.
As for the UNO, it intervened to restore peace in the Island of Bougainville. The OCDE (Organization of Cooperation and Economic Development) has forced several States to review their fiscal legislation and the Groupe d’action financière internationale (the GAFI) (International Group of financial action) is conducting a survey on certain practices.
As for France, it had been for a long time badly received in this region where it was thought of as an intruder. Inversely, France showed a severe hostility towards Anglo-Saxon powers since the General de Gaulle said to his Ministers one day: « The Anglo-Saxon are holding everything (...) in the Pacific. When we didn’t move, they said nothing. But when we appeared, it semed scandalous» (Alain Peyrefitte, C’était de Gaulle, vol 2, Ed. de Fallois/Fayard, 1997, p. 120-121). His nuclear tests in French Polynesia and his politics in New Caledonia with regard to Kanak provoked a near rejection. The end of the atomic experiments in 1996 and the signature of the Treaty of denuclearization of Rarotonga, the Matignon Treaty (1988) and the Noumea Treaty (1998) having restored peace in New-Caledonia and the grant of a large autonomy to the French Polynesia had allowed France to find a better picture, particularly as the three French entities seemed as oasis of peace and prosperity in this Oceanian world going adrift. Since 2004, these French lands are in the grips of instability in their turn. In New Caledonia, the electors and the militants of its party cut off the historical leader Jacques Lafleur. The majority who governs the country is composite. The Kanaks are attached to an interpretation of the Constitution that would prevent the new arrivals from voting in the local elections because they fear being marginalized for good. Other political forces wanted the usual texts to be applied on the right of vote. In French Polynesia, the old President Gaston Flosse – just like the French government – did not accept the result of the polls that, against all expectations, had given the victory to a coalition directed by the Separatist Oscar Temaru. A crisis that lasted several months has harmed France’s image a lot. Slowly, Oscar Temaru consolidated his power that was fragile. With the style that was his own, the President Temaru wanted to embark on a « less arrogant » policy vis-à-vis the Anglo-Saxon countries of the region and looked for new relations with France that could lead, in about a decade, to an associated State formula. At Wallis and Futuna, very exceptional territory, where the Church played a substantial role accepted by the statut of TOM of 1961, three kings represented the customary authority. The exercise of the Justice involved sharing between the customary authorities and the State Justice. France did not know how to enforce liberty of the press in order not to offend the customary authority. Currently a conflict is heightening the passions between the supporters of the traditional custom around the old king of Wallis and the « renovators» who wish to modernize the practices and more or less support the representatives of the State in their will to enforce the legitimate State.
This region that the world generally only knows for its idyllic aspect (dream islands that include the old myth of Tahiti) or possibly when a crisis breaks out (as In New Caledonia in 1984) is in fact a zone of instability in which some great powers tend to stretch their hegemony. It is the case of Australia and France. Each one has its style, but the Oceanians do not seem to be convinced that the best way to solve their problems is by imposing a modernity that would wipe out their customs and their traditions (see Paul de Deckker and Laurence Kuntz, La bataille de la coutume and ses enjeux pour le Pacifique Sud, L’Harmattan, 1998, 238 p.). The General de Gaulle has undoubtedly judged things well during his 1956 trip: « I had felt that there is a world of Pacific ». To study it, is first to « forget» what one has learnt elsewhere.
Others books
- Paul de Deckker, Jean-Marc Regnault, « La question nucléaire dans le Pacifique Sud. Travaillisme, syndicalisme et Eglises océaniennes dans les relations internationales », in Revue d’Histoire diplomatique, 2003, n° 1, p. 63 à 81.
- Jean-Marc Regnault (sous la dir) : François Mitterrand et les territoires français du Pacifique (1981-1988) : mutations, drames et recompositions ; enjeux internationaux et franco-français, préfacé par Serge Berstein, Les Indes Savantes, Paris, 584 p., 2003.
- Jean-Marc Regnault, Le pouvoir confisqué en Polynésie française. L’affrontement Temaru/Flosse, Les Indes Savantes, Paris, 2005, 184 p.
- Jean-Marc Regnault , “La France à la recherche de sites nucléaires : 1957-1963”, Cahiers du Centre d’Étude d’Histoire de la Défense, n° 12, 2000, p. 29 à 54.
- Sémir Al Wardi, Jean-Marc Regnault, « La crise politique en Polynésie française, 2004-2005 », Regards sur l’actualité, La Documentation française, n°310, avril 2005, p. 81 à 89.
- Jean-Marc Regnault, Ismet Kurtovitch, « Nouvelle-Calédonie : 150 ans de cohabitation fragile », Hermès n°32-33, CNRS Paris, mars 2002, p. 163 à 170.
- Jean-Marc Regnault, « Une zone d’instabilité méconnue, le Pacifique insulaire », Le Monde Diplomatique, juin 2005, p. 26-27., p. 26-27. |
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