The government is divided over the repeal of land rights in Mayotte

The issue is already challenging the delicate cohesion of the government, two short weeks after its appointment. In a column in Le Figaro, published on Saturday, Manuel Valls (Overseas), Bruno Retailleau (Interior) and Sébastien Lecornu (Armies) announced “firmness measurements” against immigration in Mayotte, devastated by cyclone Chido. This, while a first special law must already be presented on Wednesday to the Council of Ministers to rebuild the archipelago, the 101st French department since 2011 and the poorest in France.

The battery of proposals, put forward by the three ministers, should appear in a second bill “worked in consultation with elected officials from Mahor”they said. Among the emergency measures, the latter notably mentioned the need to return to land rights in Mayotte, which has been weakened for several years by a serious migration crisis. A possible removal would prevent children born to foreign parents from obtaining French nationality – while the island is subject to migratory pressure from neighboring Comoros. “In Mayotte, with 12,000 births per year, we are the largest maternity ward in Europe. 90% of pregnant women are foreigners and it is clearly the law of the land that these people are targeting”denounced last February Estelle Youssoufa, Liot MP (Liberties, Independents, Overseas and Territories) from Mayotte.

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At the edge of the archipelago, on December 30, François Bayrou had already relaunched the debate, without specifying the method he intended to use. “It’s a question that needs to be asked, that I asked in a previous presidential campaign”he declared. A path also encouraged by the Minister of Justice, Gérald Darmanin. “It’s obviously the right path”he pleaded this Monday morning on RTL.

Before recalling that he himself had requested the repeal of land law, a year earlier, during his time at the Ministry of the Interior. “It will no longer be possible to become French if you are not yourself the child of French parents, we will reduce the attractiveness that there is in the Mahorais archipelago” he argued Gérald Darmanin last February during a trip to the island. But the project could not be completed. “I see that there are now many converts”he slipped, in a barely veiled allusion to the words of Manuel Valls in a column in Le Monde, last February.

The new Overseas Minister judged at the time that “believing that land law is responsible for the unbearable situation experienced by Mayotte is an error of analysis”. The same day on France Inter, the former socialist even warned that calling this right into question would open “an extremely dangerous Pandora's box”. His position has evolved.

“Other measures can be taken”

Despite the change of heart from number three in the government, ministers are however struggling to speak with one voice on this flammable issue. Invited on Sunday on BFMTV, Élisabeth Borne considered, contrary to her colleagues, that the abolition of land law was not the “right way”. “Other measures can be taken”said the Minister of National Education, whose fight against “fraudulent acknowledgments of paternity”.

Internally divided, the government will first have to find a majority if it intends to revise this right enshrined in the Constitution. Including in the ranks of the presidential camp, still traumatized by the painful adoption of the immigration bill in December 2023. Above all, the abolition of land law should be submitted to the National Assembly then to the Senate, before be voted on by a 3/5 majority of Congress. A long and complex procedure which could discourage the executive, without a majority at the Palais Bourbon.

Evasive on the issue, François Bayrou could instead choose to give a new turn of the screw to access to land law in Mayotte. Since the asylum and immigration law of 2018, it is required for children born on the archipelago that one of their parents has, on the day of birth, resided on the national territory for more than three months and on a regular basis.