NEW CALEDONIA — Polls opened in New Caledonia for provincial elections, the first such elections since 2019. Approximately 192,000 eligible voters will elect 76 councillors for three provincial assemblies.

A previous plan to extend voting rights to non-Indigenous long-term residents contributed to riots in 2024, which resulted in 14 deaths and more than two billion euros worth of damage. A law approved in May added approximately 10,575 previously excluded residents to the electoral roll, including more than 4,000 individuals with customary civil status, which denotes Kanaks. The electoral roll had been frozen under a 1998 agreement.

The 76 councillors will fill seats in the provincial assemblies, with 40 seats in the South Province, 22 in the North Province, and 14 in the Loyalty Islands. Fifty-four of the elected councillors will then become members of New Caledonia's congress, the territory's primary governing institution and the only body authorized to pass local laws. Members of the congress will subsequently elect up to 11 members to the executive branch, known as the collegial government.

The election was originally scheduled for later in 2024. In the lead-up to these elections, the main pro-independence group rejected the Bougival Accord with France. This accord would have established a Caledonian state and a Caledonian nationality enshrined in the French constitution, while also scrapping any future referendums on independence. New Caledonia held referendums on independence in 2018, 2020, and 2021; all returned majorities favoring continued association with France. Pro-independence groups boycotted the 2021 referendum.

France has deployed approximately 2,400 law enforcement officers to New Caledonia, who are scheduled to remain in the territory until mid-July. French Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu indicated that negotiations on New Caledonia's future would resume next month, with the goal of reaching an agreement before the end of the year.