PHILIPSBURG – “The term binding advice is an oxymoron.” UP-MP Franklin Meyers said on Friday during a debate in the central committee of Parliament about the draft national ordinance Integrity Chamber. “An advice is an advice and it is up to the Council of Ministers to adhere to it or not. If it is binding it should be called an instruction.” The debate in Parliament lasted about 2.5 hours. Prime Minister and Minister of General Affairs, Rafael Boasman, walked the Parliament through the history of the Integrity Chamber legislation, ending with a remark about the negative advice that came back…
Author: The Publisher
By Hilbert Haar Local politicians are – for the most part – playing nice with the draft national ordinance Integrity Chamber. That institution has to be established sooner rather than later and with the Dutch demand to make this a condition for the release of a 550 million recovery fund, the matter has become rather urgent. That Parliament will approve the law is already a done deal, even though – as USp-MP Frans Richardson pointed out on Friday – most parliamentarians haven’t even read the 90-page document that contains all the details about the legislation. Richardson noted that at least…
CAY HILL — On Thursday, December 7th, at approximately 4:50pm the Police Traffic Department was called to investigate a traffic accident that occurred. A police vehicle traveling down the hill on A.J.C Brouwers Road with sirens on, transporting a suspect, collided with a red quad traveling up the hill behind a grey van. Driver of the grey van pulled to the extreme right to allow the police vehicle to pass. The driver of the quad who did not hear the sirens, started to pass the grey van and collided with the police vehicle. The driver of the quad got…
Parliament has been in full swing this past week. We have seen a number of meetings held on discussion topics, amendments and a draft law debate, namely an urgent Central Committee meeting about the Draft National Ordinance Integrity Chamber. Click here for more details on the Draft National Ordinance Integrity Chamber for those who have not read the draft yet… President of Parliament, Sarah Wescot-Williams, has aptly pointed out in her press statement that Parliament does not have ‘caretaker’ status. So the work continues unabated. However, we can’t shake the impression that the frequency of meetings held has increased significantly…
Simpson Bay — The ninth book launched on Friday evening, December 8th, at the Oba Oba lounge in Simpson Bay by the Beyond Kultura Foundation is considered a wonderful success says author, Loekie Morales, in an interview with stmaartennews.com. Also present at the book launch was minister of Culture, the honourable Silveria Jacobs. In the photo seen above are left, illustrator, Penka Petkova, and right, author Loekie Morales, during a short break from their book signing to speak with stmaartennews.com. Next book to follow will feature a boy this time in an adventure during the passing of hurricane Irma, says…
SANTA CLARA, CA. — Sint Maarten telephone company TELEM GROUP, represented by CEO Kendall Dupersoy and Senior IT Administrator Edgardo Lynch, were at DELL EMC Executive Briefing Center in Santa Clara California this week. The briefing was focused on Digital Transformation, specifically the challenges and opportunities resulting from technology innovation. The visit was facilitated by DELL EMC Regional Manager Jose Torres and Computech NV represented by its Managing Partners, Jean Arnell, Alain Roper and Senior Systems Engineer, Johann Charlery. The DELL EMC Executive Briefing Center offers a hands-on environment for businesses and governments to discover the value of DELL EMC…
Gracita rightfully points out in her letter to the editor that the best way to help the unemployed citizens of our country – according to Dennis Richardson aka Mr. Hurricane there are 6000 unemployed – is to pump money via unemployment benefits into the local economy. However, there is a good chance that some of that money will be sent overseas to the home countries of some of these unemployed persons. The French has a better idea. They use a voucher system or a money card system whereby the funds on that card has to – and can only -…
PHILIPSBURG – The meeting of Parliament about recovery plans after hurricane Irma was cut short on Thursday afternoon when National Alliance MPs left the meeting without a quorum. MP Theo Heyliger, who had just started chairing the meeting to enable MP Sarah Wescot-Williams to make a statement, had no other option than to adjourn the meeting to a later date. Earlier, Heyliger had painted a bleak picture of the main government-owned companies. “GEBE will lose 35 percent of its revenue, the airport 50 percent next year. The harbor will see fewer than one million cruise passengers in 2018. How are…
PHILIPSBURG – The Court in First Instance will take a decision on Friday about a request by the public prosecutor to put brothel owner Etienne ‘Toochi’ Meyers and his co-defendant Louella Marianella R. (50) behind bars again. The prosecutor made the request on Wednesday during a pro forma hearing against the 66-year old Meyers and his co-defendants in the so-called Pompeii-investigation, but the court took not an immediate decision because lead-defense attorney Eldon Sulvaran could not be present in court. On his behalf, attorney Shaira Bommel objected to a decision to terminate the suspension of her clients’ pretrial detention. The…
PHILIPSBURG – DP-MP Perry Geerlings took some heat from NA-parliamentarians yesterday morning with a remark about the absence of ministers in a public meeting. Geerlings made the remark after Prime Minister Boasman had excused Minister of Finance Richard Gibson and Minister of Tourism, Economic Affairs, Transport and Telecommunication Mellissa Arrindell-Doncher because of health reasons. “The ministers that show up this morning show their respect for Parliament.” Geerlings said to the two Council of Ministers members that were present – Prime Minister Rafael Boasman and Public Health Minister Emil Lee. “That respect has been lacking for the past couple of weeks.…
