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GONG (Independentist organization, Guadeloupe)

Groupe pour l'Organisation Nationale de la Guadeloupe

Presentation of GONG
Flags of GONG

See also:

Presentation of GONG

GONG (Groupe pour l'Organisation Nationale de la Guadeloupe) was founded on 23 June 1963 by members of AGEG (Association Générale des Étudiants Guadeloupéens), the student's organization supported by PCG (Parti Communiste Guadeloupéen), and by deserters from the Algerian War. In 1965, GONG set up FGA (Front Guadeloupéen pour l'Autonomie) with PCG. FGA broke down during the 1965 French presidential election: GONG called for "revolutionary abstention" while PCG supported François Mitterrand. GONG turned to a radical independentist movement, aiming at "erecting Guadeloupe a sovereign state [...] by the national and people's democratic revolution".

In 1965-1967, GONG was the main independentist movement in Guadeloupe. It was supported by the newspaper La Vérité, founded by former members of PCG. In May 1967, street demonstrations were repressed by the police, which caused the death of a dozen of demonstrators. The first of them, Jacques Nestor, was presented as a member of the GONG. Arrested, several members of GONG were tried at the State Safety Court in Paris; however, the Court could not prove their direct involvement in the May 1967 events and they were released after 9 months' imprisonment.

Soon after the trial, GONG split into two factions: "GONG démissionnaires" (GONG Resignees), with Maoist leanings, criticized the lack of interest of the GONG founders for the agricultural labourers, mostly employed in sugarcane farms. During the 1970 three-month sugarcane strike, "GONG démissionnaires" founded the worker's union UTA (Union des Travailleurs Agricoles).
GONG was extinct in 1973. Former members of GONG established in 2003 COPAGUA (Collectif de Patriotes Guadeloupéens), an organization that founded in 2005 the nationalist monthly Patryot.
[Guadeloupe : les nationalistes à la recherche de troupes dans la classe ouvrière (text). Lutte de classe, No. 95, June 1982]

Ivan Sache, 28 October 2012

Flags of GONG

Reported flags of GONG - Images by Jaume Ollé & Ivan Sache, 28 October 2012
Left, first flag;
Middle, second flag, c. 1970;
Right, third flag, 1974.

The flag with the white star is represented on the cover of the book Vie et survie d'un fils de Guadeloupe (image) by Pierre Sainton, a founding member of GONG. The similarity with the flag of Cuba is straightforward, the blue stripes being here changed for green ones.
The Flag Bulletin, Vol. 3, No. 1 (1964) reports the very same flag for FLNG (Front de Libération Nationale de la Guadeloupe); there is, however, no historical evidence of any movement called FNLG. The flag report must indeed concern GONG, erroneously called FNLG in the source.

The flag with the yellow star could have been used by the "GONG démissionnaires", the yellow rather than white star showing their Maoist leanings.

Ivan Sache, 28 October 2012