French President Emmanuel Macron greeted, on Thursday, July 29, the 60th anniversary of the status of Wallis and Futuna, that he had presented as “the most atypical of the Republic”. According to Macron, the archipelago would benefit from evolving if the local officials of wished so.
Welcoming the “unwavering link” between the territory and France, Emmanuel Macron judged that the 1961 statute, which has hardly changed since, was “certainly the most atypical of the Republic, with its prefect in charge of the executive , its territorial council where three customary kings sit, its constituencies instead of the communes ”.
But “this specificity does not imply fixity,” Macron said. “It could, doubtless would gain, to take root more in the Republic,” he added.
“It is a reflection which belongs to you (…) The State will be at your disposal, attentive to accompany you in these evolutions”, in “a consensual manner when the time comes”, the French President concluded, speaking to Wallisian and Futunian people and political leaders.
Emmanuel Macron’s speech (french version) on Wallis and Futuna 60th anniversary :
