Philippe Gomès

Who is Philippe Gomès?

Philippe Gomès is a New Caledonian politician and, from 5 June 2009 to 11 March 2011, President of the Government of New Caledonia, an overseas territory of France in the Pacific Ocean.

Gomès was born in Algiers, Algeria. He was appointed by the Congress of New Caledonia after the provincial election held on May 10, 2009. He is backed by a wide coalition of the four main loyalists parties that control 36 of the 54 seats in the Congress, now political allies after having fought each other during the campaign : The Rally–UMP, Caledonia Together, Future Together and Movement for Diversity. In the Government, 7 of the 11 members come from those pro-France parties.

A former member of RPCR, Gomès left it in 2004 to found with others dissidents the Future Together party that defeated RPCR in the provincial election on May 9, 2004. Then, Philippe Gomès became president of the South Province, by far the most economically developed and most urbanized part of New Caledonia. After a conflict between him and some members of the party, including Harold Martin or Didier Leroux, he entered again in dissent, leaving Future Together to create his own movement called Caledonia Together.