Concerned about Compliance with International Human Rights Standards PHILIPSBURG – PFP Members of Parliament Melissa Gumbs and Raeyhon Peterson have submitted questions to Minister Anna Richardson, following the Minister’s announcement that the country’s immigration laws would be “strictly enforced,” as well as encouraging those without resident permits to voluntarily leave the island or face detainment and deportation. The faction has stated publicly that the country’s rampant illegal immigration problem has desperately needed attention for over ten years now and both MPs commend the Minister for at least taking the initiative to start the discussion to handle this issue. However, both…
Author: The Publisher
AIRPORT — Some 14 residents of Guyana were repatriated back to their country of birth on the afternoon of Saturday, June 13th, 2020. A charter flight that originated out of Guyana brought back several Dutch nationals who were stuck in Guyana for several months following the COVID-19 lockdown. This flight was made possible through serious negotiations between the Guyana Consul to St. Maarten Kim Lucas-Felix, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Guyana, and the Department of Foreign Relations on St. Maarten. These negotiations were ongoing for several weeks, and it was seen as positive for all parties. The Trans Guyana…
PHILIPSBURG — In a personal interview with StMaartenNews.com, Chairman of the Board of the St. Maarten Academy PSVE (Preparatory Secondary Vocational Education) Roland E. Duncan called on the government to just cut the school subsidy by 12,5% and leave his school alone. In this interview, Roland Duncan, former minister of justice, talks about how the government is demanding 12,5% of the teacher’s salaries. The government has instructed the schools to deduct 12,5% of the personnel costs. The schools don’t particularly have to touch salaries. However, as Duncan pointed out, the only personnel costs the schools have are the salaries. As…
PHILIPSBURG — There are always fireworks to be expected during the IPKO sessions. Last week, it was the ‘war of words’ between MP Claudius “Toontje” Buncamper and MP Andre Bosman that sparked some fireworks in this year’s IPKO meetings, held virtually on June 10th and 11th, 2020. After the opening presentation by MP William Marlin, St. Maarten’s Chairman of the Committee of Kingdom Affairs and Interparliamentary Relations, MP Bosman spoke about Marlin’s statements and how in 2017, the St. Maarten government was hostile after the hurricane. That is why the Netherlands chose to go the way of the World Bank/Trust…
PHILIPSBURG — StMaartenNews.com was expecting some fireworks during last week’s IPKO meeting, especially with the de-colonization stance of MP Grisha Heyliger-Marten. She wants this process to be finally finalized using Article 73 in a meeting to be held next year, June 2021. However, the MP kept her speech very short and to the point. She cited the democratic deficits due to the minority position of St. Maarten in the CFT and in the RMR (Kingdom Council of Ministers). MP Heyliger-Marten did not mince words and concluded her short speech by saying: “The simplest thing we can do is finalize the…
By Hilbert Haar If I assume that the finance ministry is putting together the country’s budgets to the best of its abilities the conclusion must be that there is definitely something wrong. Maybe not with those abilities but with the decision making process of our government. Is this a matter of unwillingness or have we been pushed so far into a corner that we are unable to make other – or better decisions? You tell me. I am thinking about the poor state of the Pointe Blanche prison and about more than thirty reports from the Progress Committee that have…
PHILIPSBURG — Financial supervisor Cft has expressed serious criticism about St. Maarten’s approved 2020 budget in a letter to Finance Minister Ardwell Irion dated May 20. The letter became public this week. The Cft urges St. Maarten to amend its budget, among others by budgeting for improvements at the Pointe Blanche prison and to include these investments in the capital account. In 2019 the government budgeted 5.7 million guilders ($3.18 million) for improvements to the detention situation, but because the country did not receive the required loan for it, the project stalled. This investment is not part of the capital…
PHILIPSBURG — Former Minister of Justice and Attorney at Law Roland E. Duncan says that it is nearly impossible to revoke a person’s permanent residence permit. It is difficult to send them back to their country of birth or bar them from coming back to the island. “These persons with permanent residence documents must first commit a very serious crime before they are repatriated to their home country,” Duncan said. StMaartenNews.com contacted Duncan after the Minister of Justice, Anna E. Richardson announced to the general public in a media statement on Wednesday that the immigration laws of Sint Maarten will…
By Hilbert Haar MP Grisha Heyliger-Marten is on the decolonization warpath. She has called Prime Minister Silveria Jacobs to parliament asking whether she is prepared “for the process of finalizing decolonization and assuming more autonomy to govern.” Heyliger-Marten is ambitious: she wants to finalize what she calls the decolonization process by July 1, 2021 – that’s, give or take, a bit more than twelve months from now. The way things go in St. Maarten (it took forever to change the rules of order for the parliament and becoming an autonomous country took ten years) this is obviously a mission impossible.…
PHILIPSBURG – The labor unions and the Council of Ministers still have not reached an agreement about the 12.5 cut in the labor conditions for civil servants – a requirement for receiving continued financial support from the Netherlands. From a press release issued by the CCSU (Committee Civil Servants Unions), it appears that the unions are willing to agree to the deferral of certain entitlements but that they want to get that money back in subsequent years. As the latest in a seemingly endless series of proposals and counter-proposals, the unions proposed on June 1 a deferral of 50 percent…
