PHILIPSBURG – In the supervision of mental health care in St. Maarten, the Minister of Public Health, Social Development and Labor (VSA), the Health Inspectorate and the Public Prosecution Office do not comply with the existing law. This collective failure has left the Mental Health Foundation’s health personnel at the mercy of the institution’s management and board. The quality of the care provided is worrying: at least two patients have fallen victim to negligence. Developing story: Another mental health patient dies…. Related article: Psychiatric patient dead in solitary confinement On August 25 this year, a 43-year-old bipolar patient was found…
Author: The Publisher
PHILIPSBURG – The jury is still out on the cause of death of 43-year old psychiatric patient Caulette Julien. Dr. Kitty Pelswijk, the interim director of the Mental Health Foundation claims that Julien died of natural causes. Dr. Mercuur has a different opinion: he maintains that this is a case of unnatural death. Related article: Psychiatric patient dead in solitary confinement Attorney Cor Merx, who once was a prosecutor in Roermond, wrote in 1988 an extensive article about the distinction between natural and unnatural death in Dutch Forensic Magazine under the headline: The death in medical and legal perspective. Relevant…
PHILIPSBURG – Veel buitenlandse eigenaren en huurders van vakantievilla’s en appartementen op St. Maarten twijfelen eraan of zij dit jaar op St. Maarten gaan overwinteren. De kosten van een verplichte Covid-verzekering kunnen voor een echtpaar oplopen tot enkele duizenden dollars, terwijl die extra dekking voor de toch al goed verzekerde bezoekers niet nodig is. Dit is een van de redenen waarom de COVID-verzekering nog niet verplicht is, zegt minister van Toerisme, Economische Zaken, Transport en Telecommunicatie (TEATT) Ludmila de Weever. St. Maarten wil het voorbeeld van Aruba volgen met de invoering van een extra verzekering voor niet-ingezetenen die in geval…
10.10.10 – 10.10.20 ~ Sint Maarten’s First Decade as a Constituent State of the Kingdom of the Netherlands ~ A Turbulent Constitutional Odyssey by Julio R. Romney [Instructions: Use the viewer below to open and read this white paper on your device.]
Dear Editor, I recently read your article concerning a letter sent by Pro Soualiga to the Cft. In said article, there were some erroneous and misleading statements. 1) The Court’s decision had nothing to do with the content of the letter addressed to the CfT. The court deemed Pro Soualiga to be inadmissible because they claimed that the Articles of Incorporations were missing. Additionally, the court stated that the Dutch State was not given enough time to respond to its grievances, and that there was no urgency regarding the CRE because no agreement had been reached between St. Maarten and…
PHILIPSBURG — Many foreign condo owners and renters on St. Maarten have doubts about hibernating on the island this year. The cost of mandatory COVID-19 insurance can run up to several thousand dollars for a couple, while that extra coverage is unnecessary for the already well-insured visitors. This issue is one of the reasons why COVID insurance has not yet been made mandatory, according to Minister of Tourism, Economic Affairs, Transport and Telecommunication (TEATT) Ludmila de Weever. St. Maarten wants to follow the example of Aruba with the introduction of an extra insurance for non-residents that covers the medical evacuation…
PHILIPSBURG – Education is about to return, at least partially, to normal on Monday, October 19, it appears from two press releases issued by Minister of Education Drs. Rodolphe Samuel. “Some schools are in full compliance with school safety plans while others still require minor adjustments,” the minister stated. Update: Latest press release Min. ECYS dated Sunday, October 18, 2020 The Foundation for Secondary Education Windward Islands (SVOBE) will be ready to receive students back in the classroom one week later, on October 26, the SVOBE-board announced. It informed the ministry that it needs some more time to finalize all…
PHILIPSBURG – The report Retrospective – Ten years of the General Audit Chamber – revisits the state of affairs at the Bureau Telecommunication and Post (BTP), five years after it first took a closer look at this institution. The situation has not improved: BTP is not transferring funds to the government as it is required to do on a quarterly basis and its director Anthony Carty is unaware of TEATT-Ministry’s intention to buy the BTP building on Cannegieter Street. Related article: Audit Chamber report reveals abuse of public funds The national budget projects income of 1.9 million guilders (a bit…
Dear Editor, In trying to understand the relative failure of the first decade of Country Sint Maarten, I keep getting directed to the strange lack of vision of many leading politicians regarding the relationship with the Netherlands. They find themselves as an autonomous country with some limitations. In almost every situation, the limitations of autonomy in some fashion become the subject of discussion rather than the authority they do enjoy. If these limitations are so excessively burdensome, why are they not putting very substantial energy into an alternative structure? I see no evidence of real research into alternatives. It seems…
By Hilbert Haar Finance Minister Ardwell Irion’s plan to float a 75 million guilders bond issue has resulted in an ugly dog fight with financial supervisor Cft. United People’s party leader Rolando Brison added his two cents by claiming that the Cft is interpreting the relevant article in the kingdom law financial supervision in a way “they find convenient for their modus operandi.” Irion claimed that article 16 of the Rft only applies to loans for capital expenditures, while he intends to use the money from the bond issue to cover operational expenditures. Related article: UP-leader Brison spins the 75…
