Dear Editor, Super hurricanes are likely to be a regular feature of island life in the Caribbean in the future. The Irma experience and the Dorian experience in the Abacos and Grand Bahama are going to be repeated and the territories who are going to suffer this experience can best be fully familiar with the challenges of bouncing back. We should learn everything we can about resilience and reconstruction. The Abacos/Grand Bahama experience is not comparable to Sint Maarten in respect of its greater vulnerability of low lying areas, although this applied to Sint Maarten to some extent in some…
Author: The Publisher
PHILIPSBURG — MP Franklin Meyers has just announced in Parliament that he withdrew his support from the government. “I hereby withdraw my support from the present government!” he said in ending his speech this morning during the closing of the 2018-2019 parliamentary year on Monday, September 9, 2019. Whether he has withdrawn his support from the coalition remains to be seen. But with MP Frans Richardson in extended detention and with only 14 members sitting in Parliament, MP Meyers withdrawing his support from the government brings the number of MPs supporting the government to only 7 in Parliament. UD member…
PHILIPSBURG — New care contracts have been signed between SZV and private practice psychologists Miranda Veltman, Caroline van Oost, Carmencita Dekkers-Chemont and Alexandra van Luijken. The care contract offers SZV insured medical coverage for assessment, consult, support and therapy from the psychologists. All three psychologists are members of the Association of Psychologists and Allied Professionals (APAP). The care contract between the parties include several layers of quality indicators that form a minimum standard of quality of care required to patients. Efficient and quality service delivery is important to all parties. The contract between SZV and the psychologists provides the needed…
~ Central Bank CBCS intervenes with the application of the emergency regulation ~ WILLEMSTAD/PHILIPSBURG — Banco Del Orinoco N.V., established in Curaçao since 1987 as as international bank of Venezuelan origin, is in chaos. The financial figures are unreliable, there is no ability to pay account holders their money and there is talk of fraud and deceit. This is evident from reading the judgment based on which the emergency regulation demanded by the Central Bank was issued yesterday, as well as the special authorizations granted to the CBCS. In a press release, the CBCS says it nicely: “The Central Bank…
PHILIPSBURG – Member of Parliament Rolando Brison has invited Leona Peterson Naude, the spokeswoman for the disgruntled timeshare owners at The Towers at Mullet Bay to testify to the parliamentary inquiry committee about her experiences – should such an inquiry become a reality. Brison answered Peterson’s letter in which she explained the situation at The Towers where timeshare owners have been unable to use their weeks since the property sustained damages caused by Hurricane Irma in 2017. Brison wrote that Peterson’s testimony “would help government take action and change laws.” The MP also invited Peterson to a Skype call or…
Op-Ed about the merits of recruitment in the selection process for supervisory board member candidates By Hilbert Haar I recently had to have a document certified by the Dutch consulate in Cambodia to prove that I am still alive. Pension funds like to know that you’re not six feet under while they keep forking over your pension; understandable. I found the honorary Dutch consul in Siem Reap and while I was on the way I thought: how the hell do you become an honorary consul? The lady in question enlightened me. She had to submit an application to the King.…
WILLEMSTAD, PHILIPSBURG — The Centrale Bank van Curaçao en Sint Maarten (CBCS) was forced, in view of deficiencies at Banco del Orinoco N.V., to petition the Court of First Instance of Curaçao to adopt an emergency measure with respect to Banco Del Orinoco. The petition was made in the interest of depositors and other creditors of Banco Del Orinoco. The emergency measure for Banco Del Orinoco was pronounced by the Court of First Instance of Curaçao on September 5, 2019. As a result of the emergency measure, Banco Del Orinoco cannot be forced to satisfy its debts. Any pending enforcement…
CAY HILL — The National Institute for Professional Advancement (NIPA) has partnered with Trinidad-based MIC Institute of Technology (MIC-IT), initially under a one-year contract slated to end December 2019, to offer various courses to the community of St. Maarten. An agency of the Trinidad Ministry of Education, MIC-IT offers courses in Technical and Vocational Training; Industry Services; and Construction Services. MIC-IT, accredited in 2014 by the Accreditation Council of Trinidad and Tobago (ACTT), has collaborated with NIPA to provide free technical vocational courses in carpentry, plumbing, electrical, masonry and property maintenance that allow students to graduate with fitting credentials. The…
CAY HILL — On Thursday, September 5, 2019, the campus of the National Institute for Professional Advancement, NIPA, was the site of the graduation of the second cohort of the St. Maarten Emergency Income Support and Training Project. Whereas the first cohort had 72 graduates, the second cohort produced 94 graduates. Steering Committee Member of the St. Maarten Recovery Trust Fund, Marcel Gumbs, urged the graduates to continue with the training programs as he pledged to go back for more money for the NIPA training programs which were already funded by the World Bank Trust Fund to the tune of…
PHILIPSBURG – Minister of Tourism and Economic Affairs Stuart Johnson admits in veiled terms in a letter to attorney Sjamira Roseburg that Member of Parliament Frans Richardson is in some way involved with the Bureau Telecommunication and Post (BTP). Richardson is currently detained on suspicion of bribery and abuse of his position as a parliamentarian.
