Virginie Ruffenach, leader of the loyalist Rassemblement, was elected president of New Caledonia's Congress on July 10 after the pro-France bloc struck a 'governance' coalition with the smaller Éveil Océanien party, ending over a year of institutional deadlock that had followed the May 2024 elections and the 2024 anti-France riots that killed 14 people
The territory's first provincial vote since the 2024 independence-referendum unrest gave loyalists 24 of 54 Congress seats and pro-independence blocs 26, leaving the four-seat centrist Kanak party Éveil Océanien to decide who governs, and at what price, ahead of July Paris talks