A/HRC/18/35/Add.6 Senate will be diminished as powers are transferred from France to New Caledonia, and decentralized to provincial and communal authorities. 27. While Kanaks enjoy significant representation in political bodies and through the Customary Senate, their participation at administrative levels of government remains low. Some efforts are being made to address this situation. The “400 cadres” programme for managers, referred to in the Nouméa Accord (art. 4.1.2) has trained between 600 and 750 Kanak management professionals, representing roughly 75 per cent of programme graduates; the programme now requires 80 per cent Melanesian participation. However, increased efforts are needed to ensure Kanak representation in public administration, especially among higher level positions. According to data provided by the Customary Senate, while there are 528 Kanaks in the civil service today (out of a total of 3,660), only 57 are in positions of middle or upper management. 28. A final challenge to Kanak political participation emerges from the voting process. The Special Rapporteur was informed that as many as 1,500 Kanaks, for a variety of reasons, are not registered on the proper electoral list. The Special Rapporteur notes with approval the efforts underway to rectify this situation in order to ensure that all Kanak citizens can exercise their right to vote, not only in the post-2014 referendum, but in all national and provincial elections. Voting rights are also hampered by regulations requiring citizens to vote in the province in which they are registered. Many Kanaks who are registered to vote in North or Loyalty Islands provinces have migrated to greater Nouméa, and given the cost of travel, these voters are effectively disenfranchised. C. Lands and resources 29. Also important to Kanak self-determination and identity, as well as to their wellbeing and economic development potential, are rights over lands and natural resources. The Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (see especially art. 26) affirms the fundamental connection between indigenous peoples and the lands and resources that they have traditionally used or occupied The Nouméa Accord (art. 1.4) echoes this affirmation, recognizing that “every Kanak’s identity is defined primarily to an area of land.” Myths about the origin of the Kanak people invoke particular landscape features, and clan names often reference the place of origin of the clan’s founding ancestor. During ceremonies, a clan member may recite the names of places through which his ancestors would have passed, defining his origins and establishing alliances to other clans having rights over the places named. Multiple clans might have overlapping customary rights to particular land. Land reform: role of the Rural Development and Land Planning Agency 30. The French State-run Rural Development and Land Planning Agency (ADRAF) is tasked, under the Nouméa Accord, with managing land reform and surveying and registering customary lands. ADRAF has an annual budget to purchase land from private settlers or public entities, and assign it to Kanak clans having traditional ownership rights. Over the past 20 years, ADRAF has registered 125,000 hectares of land to Kanak clans, primarily from lands identified as public lands, but with some redistribution from privatelyheld lands. To facilitate these land assignments, Kanak clans have been incorporated as “Groupements de droit particulier” local (GDPLs) (groups subject to special local law) which are given title deeds to the lands. The titled lands have special customary legal status, under which it is inalienable, non-transferrable (incessible) and indivisible. In total, roughly 10