The MAGRAS Senate report and the intervention of MP TJIBAOU on 04/02/2025

Hello everyone,

The APROFED association is coming back to you this weekend to relay to you once again a report prepared in 2020 by a senator, Michel MAGRAS, then president of the senatorial delegation for overseas territories, concerning territorial differentiation overseas.

If this report aims to make proposals, particularly legal ones , with a view to developing the status of the overseas territories and the relationship with mainland France , we ultimately note, as mentioned, that most of these territories want to follow the path of New Caledonia, whose established relationships with the State are of a quasi-federal order , demonstrating that federalism constitutes the one and only solution.

We learn in this report in particular that:

– overseas territories constitute a real institutional laboratory whose experiences should feed into decentralization, including at the national level,

– all parliamentary work highlights the urgency of re-establishing the relationship between the State and the overseas territories,

– laws of countries controlled by the Advisory Council are quasi-legislative acts,

– the State is indifferent to overseas territories. All central governments have a lack of understanding of these territories,

– in the Antilles, the metropolitan government continues to reprimand them, reminding them of the prefect’s competence,

– the transfer of skills is the means of compensating for this lack of interest in an increase in local responsibilities,

– it would be appropriate to move to a logic of subsidiarity (basic principle of federalism) requiring that public policies be organized at the level closest to citizens and that it would be appropriate to set standards, therefore laws, and no longer simply have the management or the simple execution of a competence,

– the delegation proposes to create the category “overseas countries” in the Constitution in order to place the autonomy of overseas communities at the center of the relationship with the State. This terminology goes beyond the notion of a simple territorial community but below that of an autonomous State as in a federal system. The Portuguese have their autonomous regions. The Spanish, for their part, their autonomous communities like the Azores, the Canaries and Madeira given as examples. The difficulty for the notion of “country” is to be accepted within the French parliament,

– Thierry Santa, President of the Government of New Caledonia, in 2020, asked the question of whether federalism was not being established. Senator Magras replied that New Caledonia had paved the way for this , confirming that New Caledonia within France had a particular, quasi-federalist organization. The President of New Caledonia even asking that justice take advantage of the powers shared with the State (as the association also requests) taking the example of New Zealand, also constitutes a step towards federalism,

– the division of competences is possible in federal and regional states , for example in the area of ​​justice,

– Autonomy does not amount to an exit from the Republic, according to a Guyanese senator. The latter, wishing for a coexistence, a win-win partnership with France,

– autonomy for France consists of administering itself and establishing at least some of the rules applicable on its own territory,

– autonomy is a taboo term in French constitutional law,

– autonomy is not independence, it is not incompatible with belonging to the Republic,

– autonomy aims to govern oneself freely and not to administer oneself freely,

Upon reading this report, which advocates territorial differentiation between France and overseas territories, the association regrets that the Caledonian senator at the time, P. Frogier, is diverting the thought of this report to propose a territorial differentiation within New Caledonia itself, between the provinces, with a view to differentiating those governed by a majority of Europeans (white) and those governed by Melanesians (black). This is unfortunately what the internal federalism project proposed by the rally and the loyalists (non-independence) today in negotiations with the State as part of a solution to find an agreement in NC.

The association therefore agrees with the statement made by MP E.Tjibaou, who recently spoke in the National Assembly to reject this internal federalism project, which would be the source of the establishment of apartheid assumed by France if it were validated (see Questions au Gouvernement – Mardi 4 février 2025 – Mardi 4 février 2025 – Vidéos de l’Assemblée nationale ou L’Intégrale des questions au Gouvernement | 04/02/25 ).

The association recalls that it is for the continuation of the Matignon and Noumea agreements with the finalization of the federal project included in them aiming at shared sovereignty, consisting of recovering internal sovereignty to the countries, or legislative sovereignty, which we call “small independence” before a new self-determination referendum in 2053 to potentially recover external sovereignty to the countries (diplomacy, currency, nationality, armed forces, etc.) which would remain managed until then by the French State , similar to what should have been the status of “protectorate” proposed in 1853 during the colonization not only to the country but to all the French overseas territories that the State has diverted by a full and complete takeover, in order to exercise a total takeover of these territories.

Find the full MAGRAS report at the following link: Différenciation territoriale outre-mer : quel cadre pour le sur-mesure ? – Sénat

We wish you a good read and remind you that federalism is the only solution to reconcile unity in diversity.

The APROFED association