The positions of the State and elected officials of Corsica came together on Monday, February 26, regarding the constitutional reform project allowing autonomy for the island. During a dinner which lasted more than four hours, Place Beauvau in Paris, the Minister of the Interior, Gérald Darmanion, made a “proposal for constitutional writing” comprising “five major advances”, he said. informed the press during the night of Monday to Tuesday.
“I think we are moving towards a consensus,” he said, hoping that this would “then allow the Territorial Assembly, the President of the Republic and tomorrow, perhaps, the Parliament to reform the Constitution for Corsica”.
The first subject mentioned by the minister is the recognition “that the community of Corsica has a unique place in the Constitution”, with its “linguistic, cultural and island specificities” and “its attachment to the land”. Second point: the government wants Corsica to have “general authorization” to adapt legislative and regulatory texts to its situation.
Thirdly, Corsica would be endowed with legislative and regulatory competence, that is to say normative autonomy, in areas that an organic law would establish. With “two safeguards”, warned Gérald Darmanin: each text must be submitted to the Council of State for opinion and for control by the Constitutional Council. Fourth point: the Corsicans will be consulted on this new status, and will have to give their agreement.
Finally, it will be necessary to decide whether the reform is included in a title of the Constitution, as the nationalists wish, or in a simple article, an option which is preferred by the President of the Republic, Emmanuel Macron.
“Optimistic” but “cautious”
At the end of the dinner, the (autonomist) president of the executive council of Corsica, Gilles Simeoni, welcomed “a constructive state of mind, a desire to seek consensus and a certain number of very significant achievements”. “Tonight, there are serious reasons to be optimistic, even if we must continue to be cautious,” he summarized. “It is established, in the current state of the text, that Corsica will be endowed with a status of autonomy within the Republic,” he rejoiced.
Member of Parliament for Corsica-du-Sud and president of the Horizons group in the National Assembly, Laurent Marcangeli estimated that this vast institutional project had “progressed a further step”. “We haven’t reached the finish line yet but we are close, from my point of view,” he noted.
During a visit to Corsica on September 28, 2023, Emmanuel Macron gave six months – until the end of March – to island political groups, from separatists to the right, to reach an “agreement” with the government on a “constitutional and organic text” which would give Corsica “autonomy in the Republic”.
New appointment in two weeks
Asked about the introduction of a “resident status”, Gérald Darmanin underlined the absence of “consensus” around this concept, preferring to “imagine a “residence” status which could make it possible to fight against real estate speculation” in Corsica. In addition, he reaffirmed that the government did not wish to move “towards co-officiality” of Corsican, while saying he was in favor of “greater promotion” of this language.
Gérald Darmanin arranged to meet “in two weeks” with the delegation of eight Corsican elected officials, “in the same format”. “Then I will chair, if things are conclusive, a so-called strategic committee within forty-eight hours,” he said. This will be the end of the “Beauvau process”, opened two years ago.
After consultation with the Corsican Assembly, "the President of the Republic will initiate, when he wishes, constitutional reform", continued the minister, recalling that the text must be voted on by both chambers of Parliament in the same terms, then adopted by Congress by a three-fifths majority.
