The report that citizens in St. Maarten produce 22 times more household garbage than their brethren in Curacao is a rather shocking eye opener. It is also a piece of information that should guide the government towards a sustainable approach of its huge waste management problem. It is almost cynical that the same citizens that complain about the constant fires on the dump now appear to be part of the problem. Bringing waste levels down to acceptable levels should now be a top priority. To tackle this issue, the government must find out how it is possible that local citizens…
Author: The Publisher
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GREAT BAY – St. Maarten is a wasteful community. That appears from data published in an unsolicited advice from the Social Economic Council to ministers Marlin, Emmanuel, Lee and Boasman. Per capita, citizens on the Dutch side produce on average 9.7 kilo of waste per day, 22 times more than the citizens of Curacao who produce just 440 grams of waste per day. This means that the 39,410 registered citizens of St. Maarten produce 382,277 kilo of waste per day, or close to 140 million kilo per year (to be exact: 139,531,105 kilo). This alarming number adds to the pressure…
MARIGOT – On Sunday morning Governor Eugene Holiday and his wife Marie-Louise, President of Parliament Sarah Wescot Williams and Prime Minister William Marlin and his wife Gabrielle formed the government’s delegation that attended the inauguration of Daniel Gibbs as the next President of the Collectivité of St. Martin. Gibbs first launched this idea almost six years ago on September 25, 2011 in a broadcast on Radio Soualiga in Eddie Williams’ program For the Record. ”People do not believe in memoranda of understanding anymore,” he said on that occasion; on the Dutch side his initiative fell on deaf ears; it did…
Based on the latest documents this newspaper has received from sources in Aruba regarding a warning letter the Department of Civil Aviation in Aruba has issued to Aruba Airlines, giving the company 15 days to rectify the situation regarding critical vacancies in the company’s organizational structure, one could say the Caribbean aviation, especially the Dutch Caribbean aviation sector, has a curse on it. With the future of Insel Air hanging on a thread and a recent press release from the troubled airline company in Curacao stating that its lay-offs of critical positions within the company’s organizational structure is within the…
It is not surprising that Daniel Gibbs, the new president of the Collectivité dusted off his old plan for the establishment of a United Congress, consisting of members from the Dutch and the French side of the island. It makes a lot of sense, yet over the years it has met with an astounding lack of enthusiasm on the Dutch side. Gibbs has little confidence in memorandums of understanding the Dutch side is so fond off. He prefers a setting were serious agreements are made that cannot be set aside just like that in case there is a change of…
GREAT BAY- Alberto Arrindell, stage name ‘Fish Da Mega Boss’ delivered the musical punch which enabled him to captivate the panel of judges and the entire audience during the Nagico Calypso Eliminations under the tent at the Princess Port de Plaisance last Friday. At the conclusion of the competition, it had to be a moment of truth for judges solicited by RAW Promotions Roberto Arrindell, Denis van Putten, Dion Gumbs, Shujah Reiph, Claudious Jones and head judge Kendall Dupersoy after the 15 calypsonians had delivered their musical social commentaries. The ‘Mega Boss’, who was dethroned by Shakiya in the 2016…
Dear Editor, It may come as surprise to many, that two able bodied young men drowned in the waters of Mullet Bay last Saturday. Please allow me to explain my perception as to how easily this can happen, and my suggestion as to how future incidents may be avoided at minimal expense on not just this beach but to other beaches on our beautiful island. Ideally, traditional approaches adopted all over the world would be effective, such as flags and lifeguard towers or even buoyed lines (that would have the additional advantage of keeping out those pesky jet skis). A…
Is casino owner Francesco Corallo getting a fair treatment? That is the question we pose with the publication of our front page interview today. Extradition seems a fairly simple procedure – unless the request is groundless of course; there is no earthly reason to keep someone detained for more than a hundred days while everybody is waiting for a date for a court hearing. This is not just about Corallo – this could happen to any citizen. Tomorrow the court will deal behind closed doors with two requests: the suspension of Corallo’s detention and, if the court disapproves, a transfer…
By Hilbert Haar GREAT BAY – When the sun goes down today, casino owner Francesco Corallo will have spent 111 days in a cell of the House of Detention at the police station in Philipsburg. That’s 2,664 hours. Each day he is let out of cell for an hour – 30 minutes in the morning and 30 minutes in the afternoon. That leaves 2,553 hours of staring at the walls and wondering why on earth he has to be there. On Friday morning I got access to Corallo – also for thirty minutes, after a battle with the bureaucracy that…
Dear Editor, Vamed (possibly a derivative of the word that describes the result of nausea?) got its their pound of flesh and now we, a tiny 16-square mile half-of-an-island country can move on and build a new hospital. Kudos to all involved who made this (hopefully last) hurdle go away. While I still can’t grasp the concept of a company who bids higher on a specific project taking the principle of that project to court for awarding it to another company whose bid was lower (duhhh!), even more baffling is the fact that the presiding judge ruled in favor of…
