Australia could soon have a new nation next door!

Australia could soon have a new nation next door!

Only a two-hour flight from Brisbane is New Caledonia a group of picturesque islands in Melanesia that have been French-owned since 1853. But that could all be about to change.

On Sunday 4 November, those eligible among its 270,000 residents will go to the polls to answer ‘yes’ or ‘no’ to New Caledonia becoming independent. If the answer is yes, New Caledonia will enter a phase of transition to an independent sovereign nation.

If it is ‘no’, under the agreements signed by the French government 30 years ago, there can be another referendum in 2020, which if negative again can be followed by a third in 2022.