THE FRENCH

Pacific nation’s colonial legacy is still much in evidence, writes Hamish Fletcher

“W hen I see him I tell him: you are lucky to still be here,” my tour guide Ludo says of Jean-Baptiste Orly. The words are wasted on Orly, the one-time governor of New Caledonia from 1878 to 1880.

Ludo’s offhand remark, though, is directed at the French naval officer’s statue, sitting in the most shaded quadrant of Noumea’s Place des Cocotiers.

Orly is a problematic figure in New Caledonian society — best known for his violent suppression of Atai, a chief of the indigenous Kanak people.

“Seen as hero by some people, as the symbol of colonialism by others,” Ludo says of Orly.

Despite petitions for the statue to be removed, he still looms large in the square — a symbol of unease on an island that will soon choose whether or not to divorce from its colonial parent.

New Caledonia will head to the voting booth next month, in the French territory’s first independence referendum since 1987. Polls point to the island picking to remain tied to France; in May thousands of its citizens marched past the statue of Orly to show their support for Europe.

Along with the iron effigy of the strict 19th century governor, other parts of Place des Cocotiers offer a window on the island’s past. In a separate quadrant of the square is the distinct bandstand, erected in 1883. As well as being (in Ludo’s words) a “true emblem of colonial architecture” the bandstand was built by convicts brought to the island from France.

More than 21,000 prisoners were deported to New Caledonia in the 19th century — at one point making up two thirds of the country’s settler population.

A mixture of common criminals and political exiles, the last convicts arrived in 1897 but locals tell me there’s still signs of the economic divide between descendants of prisoners and those of the free settlers.

One of those early free settlers lived just a stone’s throw from Place des Cocotiers in one of Noumea’s grand old mansions, Maison