French Polynesia's president Edouard Fritch Photo: AFP
Reports from French Polynesia say the president Edouard Fritch and his supporters will launch a new political party at an inaugural congress on February the 20th.
This was announced by a private radio station in Tahiti and comes just weeks after Mr Fritch secured a majority in the territorial assembly for his Tapura Tahoeraa group.
The group was created in the aftermath of a split within the dominant Tahoeraa Huiraatira Party whose leader Gaston Flosse lost political office because of corruption but who opposed the work of his successor, Mr Fritch.
Flosse excluded some members while others, one by one, resigned to give Mr Fritch a majority.
Mr Fritch's coalition government includes the leader of the Atia Porinetia Party, Teva Rohfritsch, while his assembly group lists all pro-autonomy members who are not in Flosse's Tahoeraa Huiraatira