A top member of French Polynesia's No Oe te Nunaa Party has spoken out against a ruling to suspend the party leader, Nicole Bouteau, from the territorial assembly for one year.
The supreme court in Paris found her guilty of an election campaign irregularity which the party insists is an unintentional administrative error.
Tbe party's Gwendoline Panai has told Radio One in Tahiti that the decision is a purely political one.
She says the party fails to understand how Mrs Bouteau could be suspended when some members remain in the assembly even though they have been convicted in a criminal court.
Two party leaders, Emile Vernaudon and Gaston Flosse, have neither resigned nor been forced to vacate their seats despite being given suspended prison sentences for corruption this year.
