Out of the blue, and to everybody’s surprise, the president of Corsica Ange Santini has announced before the Corsican Assembly he was to withdraw the discussion on the PADDUC (Construction and Sustainable Development Plan of Corsica) from the parliamentary agenda. The plan has long been a controversial one, since it has been backed by the party in power (UMP, French conservatives) and partly by the opposition, but strongly criticized by autonomist, pro-independence and ecologist parties and organizations.

Santini has taken the decision seeing he was running the risk of losing the voting in the Assembly, where conservatives defending the project only hold simple majority. Corsican president has said that “dices were loaded from the start” because “political stances had been announced even before the debate”, Europe1 reports.

Nationalists from Corsica Libera (Free Corsica) have asked president Santini and president of the Assembly Camille de Rocca Serra to resign for failing to even discuss such a key plan. They added that “construction promoters and “concrete profiteers” have not yet given up seizing our land”. Most likely, the PADDUC issue will become a key matter in the forthcoming elections due in March 2010.

Further information:

• AFP: Assemblée de Corse: report de la discussion sur le projet de Plan d'aménagement
• Dossier Peoples and nations today: Corsica

Further information in Corsica profile.