French Polynesia's president Gaston Flosse is poised to lodge another bid to stay in office after an unsuccessful appeal to have a sentence for corruption wiped.
The court of appeal in Tahiti threw out his case after his lawyers tried to fend off last July's verdict of the highest court in France which stripped him of his offices as both president and member of the French Senate.
However, the French government has so far refused to deliver the verdict to make it official.
On Friday, the court found that the request for a sentence to be wiped could only be lodged after six months.
However, Flosse's lawyers say the final verdict was not the one in Paris in July but the appeal court ruling in Tahiti last year.
As a result, the Flosse team may try to test this in the highest court in France.
Meanwhile, there is an expectation that the French president Francois Hollande will decide soon on whether to pardon Flosse.
Last month, Mr Hollande said the decisions reached by the judiciary should be respected.
Gaston Flosse Photo: AFP
