One of the schools damaged by arson during the May 2024 riots in Nouméa’s Ducos area will not re-open as yet. Photo: NC la 1ère
New Caledonia's post-May 2024 riots' economic and social impact is taking its toll on over 62,000 children - about half in primary schools and the other half in secondary - going back to school this week.
At least a dozen schools (primary and secondary), particularly in the Greater Nouméa area, were targeted by arsonists as part of the civil unrest last year and cannot be reopened for the time being.
Students had to be relocated to other remaining functional establishments.
Last year, the French government pledged it would pay to rebuild all destroyed schools.
For all of New Caledonia's provinces (South, North, and Loyalty islands), the school transport's subsidised system is also severely affected.
In some cases, including in the outer islands, parents have had to organise alternative solutions themselves.
Inter-island transport was also a major issue in New Caledonia over the past weeks, as domestic airline Air Calédonie and inter-island maritime ferry Betico had to suspend their respective services for almost one week due to persistent low pressure systems, especially over the French territory's Loyalty Islands province (North-east of the main island of Grande Terre) and the Isle of Pines, off Nouméa.
In many cases as well, due to provincial budget cuts, services such as financial assistance for school meals, back-to-school allowance, and transport allowance, have been affecting at least 1000 students.
In the Southern province, New Caledonia's wealthiest province, the stringent cuts are about thirty percent of the whole budget compared to last year.
Officials said this was due to the huge losses and damages following last year's riots.
The economic repercussions of the May 2024 riots also meant that because several hundred businesses were destroyed (by arson) and looted, an estimated over 10,000 people lost their jobs and, therefore, their income.
They now find it more difficult than ever to pay for the family's back-to-school expenses.
Since last year, prices have also steadily gone up, according to local statistics institute ISEE (+0.7 percent consumer price increase just for January 2025).
High students' mobility hard to manage
New Caledonia's education authorities however say they remain "reasonably optimistic", even though they are faced with a hard-to-manage issue: the riots have triggered many population displacements.
Some children enrolled last year have now left New Caledonia while others have just moved away from Nouméa to one of the other two (Northern and Islands) provinces.
"We have to implement a return to normalcy, but we can't ignore a number of issues", said New Caledonia's government education minister Isabelle Champmoreau.
She talked of "continuity" and "appeasement".
In the Southern province, where the capital Nouméa is located, parents associations are blaming provincial authorities for now requiring students and families to produce a certificate of residence in order to justify their request to attend a a Southern school, where previously, only a document proving that the student was accommodated with a host family for the school year was required.
Still in Nouméa, the public bus transport network has been re-launched to coincide with Monday's back to school.
But the new rates are more expensive and the new network has shrunk, prompting more criticism from users.
Sensitive political context
The context is even more sensitive as French minister for Overseas Manuel Valls is expected to arrive in New Caledonia on Saturda for a week-long visit.
Valls intends to continue with partisan talks that began early February 2025 in Paris.
These negotiations focus on New Caledonia's political future and a possible future status to be negotiated in a particularly polarised atmosphere, as pro-independence and pro-France more radical parties are bent on their respective views.
The French High commission and law enforcement agencies have had to deny persistent rumours that unrest would flare up again in New Caledonia to coincide with Monday's school re-openings.
They have confirmed that reinforced security would be visible, particularly in Nouméa, with higher numbers of gendarmes and police on patrols.
Even though the curfew imposed after the riots was lifted in December 2024, a ban on all public meetings and demonstrations is still in force in Nouméa and its greater area.
