IT’S the referendum that the world forgot, but you can’t really blame others when the government that was supposed to be holding it went all quiet.
The people of the Faroe Islands – an autonomous nation within Denmark – should have been waking up today to find out the result of the referendum on its new proposed constitution which might have seen an even greater degree of independence from Denmark and a new relationship with the European Union.
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The referendum was announced to great publicity last year and the vote was set to take place yesterday, but to no great surprise for followers of the Faroes’ complex politics, the referendum has been quietly postponed as the various parties in the country’s parliament, the Logting, couldn’t agree on the wording of the new constitution.
Furthermore the postponement has not even been registered on the official Faroe Islands government website.
In what could be a lesson for the Yes movement in the next Scottish independence referendum, the Faroese government, which itself is a coalition, wanted the islanders to vote on a new constitution which would give them greater right to self-determination.
Speaking at the time, Prime Minister Aksel Johannesen said the new constitution “will define our identity as a nation and our fundamental rights and duties as a people, including our right to self-determination” as well as relations “to membership in supranational organisations, such as the EU”.
A spokesman for the government said the constitution was being redrafted and that the referendum would be held six months after that.
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