Government resigns: embattled Overseas Minister Gérald Darmanin

Riots in New Caledonia, roadblocks in Mayotte, rampant crime and drug trafficking in Guadeloupe, Martinique and Guyana… Although the government of Gabriel Attal finally withdrew from the parliamentary elections after weeks of political uncertainty, Gérald Darmanin resigned from the Ministry of the Interior and Overseas Territories.

After Emmanuel Macron came to power in 2017, the Republican right-wing defector first took charge of the Public Accounts Department with Bruno Le Maire, with the responsibility of drawing up the state budget. After Christophe Castaner left the Interior Ministry in July 2020, former UMP MP (now LR) Gérald Darmanin became the best choice to manage the Place de Beauvau. It then became symptomatic of the five-year term and took on an increasingly right-wing tone.

As a loyal supporter of the president, the MP for Tourcoing (North) will most likely rise to the position of Prime Minister of France. The head of state is re-elected after the 2022 presidential elections. But the country is more divided than ever. Emmanuel Macron thanked the then Prime Minister Jean Castex. Gérald Darmanin thought he had a chance to take charge of the government. But the president said that he would not immediately appoint a woman to the Matignon position due to pressure from all sides. Therefore, Elisabeth Bohn inherited the position.

However, due to his loyalty, the Minister of the Interior saw his responsibilities expanded. Gérald Darmanin was thus made head of the super-ministry, which included the overseas territories. Nothing new, it had already been the case in the past. But elected overseas MPs (mostly on the left) are killing themselves. The end of a full-fledged overseas ministry was a cold shower as a rift opened up between those in power and the overseas sector, regions and communities.

However, the new super-minister was not equipped to be both France’s top policeman and run the affairs of Pointe-a-Pitre, Saint-Denis, Cayenne, or Papeete. During his two years as dual minister, he delegated much of the work to ministers who often stayed in the shadows and who supervised him: Jean-François Calenco (2022-2023), Philip Virgil (2023-2024) And then there was Marie Guévenoux, who spent only a few months in the Rue Oudinot.

As full-time overseas minister, Gérald Darmanin is responsible for certain subjects that he considers key under his leadership. If his ministers increase the number of trips between Paris and the Atlantic, Indian and Pacific Oceans, he will only travel on special occasions. In particular, he will go to Mayotte and New Caledonia, two pressing issues that he has already taken up.

After Edouard Philippe and Sébastien Le Cornu, who served as prime minister and overseas minister respectively during part of Emmanuel Macron’s first five-year term, Gerald Darmanin is tackling the dangerous and delicate issue of Caledonia on his own. He will take office in 2021 after the third and final self-determination referendum passes (Those who said “no” to independence won by a large margin, but at the cost of resistance from the independence campThe goal now is the most important: to bring together the different independence and loyalist factions to agree on the future status of New Caledonia.

It is just that the government’s open pro-independence stance offends Kanak and Socialist National Liberation Front (FLNKS) activists, especially since the South Province governor, Sonia Backès, a fervent loyalist, joined the government… National Secretariat under the supervision of the Ministry of InteriorThen, despite initiatives to get both camps and countries to sit at the same table, the negotiations got bogged down.

The tenants of Place Beauvoir have made several trips to Noumea. But the problems are deep-rooted. The future of the territory is at stake, and Darmanin’s methods have unsettled more than one person. In March 2024, Roque Wamitan, the president of the National Assembly of New Caledonia and an independentist, On the 1st, he spoke on the microphone in New Caledonia : “I’ve had the opportunity to tell him: His approach is not the right way to move the discussion forward, and the evidence of that is the obstruction they’ve had with him.”

Faced with the difficulty of moving forward, and with a seeming inability to find common ground, the government opted for an ultimatum: either a local agreement or national leadership. Then the executive branch puts the draft constitution on the tableplans to partially unfreeze the Caledonian electoral institutions. The sacred legacy of the Nouméa and Matignon agreements, aimed at maintaining the political influence of the Kanaks, who are numerically inferior to the Cayotes, is unacceptable to the separatists.

For the executive, time is running out: provincial elections must be organized by 2025. Therefore, independentists and non-independence advocates are given until July 1, 2024 to reach an agreement. In the meantime, the government is moving forward with constitutional changes.

April 2024: Constitution put to a vote in the Senate. Then in May at the National AssemblyTo gain final passage, the controversial bill must be approved by the Versailles Conference, which is not expected until July. The text alone will never have a chance to pass this stage. The vote in the lower house has heightened tensions around Cayous. While the delegates are fighting, New Caledonia is on fire. The region is hit by violent riots.

On May 13, roadblocks were set up in the greater Noumea area. Buildings were burned. Clashes with police resulted in several deaths (Today, the death toll is 10). Sadly, 2024 feels like the turbulent times of the 1980s.

The defeat was a severe blow to Gerald Darmanin. He had failed to move the territory towards a peaceful future and was even accused of exacerbating tensions on the ground. The Minister of the Interior and Overseas Territories was extremely cautious. Traveled to Caio with the President of the Republic after the violence.

Despite his sometimes acerbic remarks, the 41-year-old minister always advocated dialogue. But it was in vain: he often made the Ultramarines he dealt with cringe. For example, in 2023, during a meeting on the Overseas Territories, Gérald Darmanin It is believed that the Republic abolished slavery in former French coloniesseemingly minimizing the role that the slaves themselves had played in the process of emancipation. He was vigorously questioned in Congress a few days later, but when several overseas representatives asked him to clarify his thinking, he signed on and insisted: “It was the Republic that abolished slavery”.

It must be noted that the policy of memory related to slavery is not really a subject of the Minister of the Place de Beauvoir, who chooses himself the files he wants to manage and those he likes to entrust. Water crisis in Mayotte? Philippe Vigier is in charge. What measures does the Interministerial Committee of Overseas Territories (CIOM) have to improve the daily life of residents overseas? Jean-François Carenco took on most of the work but was fired two days after presenting the CIOM’s 72 measures.

On the other hand, Gerald Darmanin has made it his mission to solve the problems of Mayotte, the poorest department of France, where socio-economic and security difficulties are concentrated. There is growing hostility towards immigrants from the Comoros, Madagascar and the African continent. For the Minister of the Interior, there is only one response that can solve the problems of the Mayotte people: security.

He will therefore establish a massive police operation in 2023 with three objectives: fighting illegal immigration, crime and unsanitary housing. He called it Operation WambushBy reinforcing the police, destroying shanty towns and expelling illegal immigrants, Gerald Darmanin hopes to regain control of Mayotte. Despite a slow start due to diplomatic and legal obstacles, the operation has achieved some results and tensions are easing in the area, which was rife with fighting between gangs, stone throwing and machete attacks.

However, at the end of June 2023, young Nahle in Nanterre, France, was killed by a police officer during a road check, sparking urban riots. Beauvo had no choice but to bring some police personnel back to France. Therefore, the calm in Mayotte is only temporary, and the country is also experiencing an unprecedented water crisis.

Stone attacks and assaults reappeared. In Mamuzu, the migrant camps set up around the Cavani Stadium concentrated all the tension and resentment of the population, who blamed asylum seekers for fuelling insecurity. Citizens’ groups were then formed. Angry people blockaded the islandsThe barge connecting Petite Terre and Grande Terre is out of service. The economy is strangled.

Gérald Darmanin, accompanied by the new deputy minister, Marie Guévenoux, was sent to the scene and issued a powerful announcement. He announced a constitutional bill abolishing land rights in Mayotteeven though the local area has been strictly restricted. This measure has caused great controversy in the French media and political circles, but the public’s demands are not high. They particularly want to abolish the territorial residence permitwhich prevents Mayotte permit holders from travelling to other parts of France.

Gérald Darmanin postponed the measure to a later date in the Mayotte bill, which had been announced for several years but was slow to implement. With the dissolution of the National Assembly and the resignation of the government, the text fell through. On the scene, the Minister of the Interior and Overseas Affairs also announced a second Wuambushu operation, Mayotte Regional NetworkLike countless anti-drug operations carried out in several French cities. But this Wawambushu 2 is far less ambitious than the first version, and far fewer reinforcements are sent to the territory.

Above all, the New Caledonian Minister and Mayotte Minister Gerald Darmanin will leave behind a legacy of territories in crisis, tension and division. If Mayotte seems a little calmer today, the end of the New Caledonian crisis remains uncertain. On Sunday, Sonia Backès, a former colleague of the Bovo tenant, pointed out that Caledonian separatists and non-independenceists are incompatible. His solution: Give the Cayo Province more autonomy so that everyone can live independently. The opposite of living together.