Theo Heyliger on rumors of impending prosecution: “Part of my life”

GREAT BAY — Once again, Member of Parliament Theo Heyliger is at the center of rumors of impending prosecution. Tuesday, July 3rd, members of the media, in particularly those of the online news sites, were alight with tips and rumors about a scheduled request of the Prosecutor’s Office to petition the Common Court of Justice to obtain permission to prosecute T.E. Heyliger as he is a political figure and member of the Parliament of Sint Maarten. The hearing was scheduled to be held at 3pm in the afternoon.

At the scheduled hour of 3pm it turned out that the hearing was cancelled. Sources opted the alternative that the hearing was held earlier in the morning and the scheduled time in the afternoon was merely a diversion. However, this could not be confirmed.

Given the fact that MP Heyliger was just that afternoon in a session in the House of Parliament talking about the ‘democracy of the people must be respected‘ in regards to the examination and approval of the credentials of incoming members of Parliament whereby Heyliger emphatically stated that there should be no need for ‘approval’ of these credentials, but merely an ‘examination’, while ironically Heyliger himself as the highest vote-getter in the country cannot become a minister, much less the prime minister, and is relegated to being only a member of Parliament due to the belief that he would not be able to pass the minister’s screening – supposedly due to ongoing suspicions against him as a politician and leader of the UP party.

StMaartenNews.com contacted the Chief Prosecutor about the supposedly cancelled petition to the Common Court to prosecute Heyliger with the following questions:

– Is it true that this request has been submitted?
– If this request has been cancelled, what is the reason for the cancellation?
– If the request has already been handled at an earlier time that day, what was the reason for the rescheduling?
– Has Mr Heyliger or his lawyer been informed of the petition?
– What is Mr. Heyliger suspected of that Prosecutor’s Office is requesting permission from the courts to prosecute him?

The press officer of the Prosecutor’s Office answered us via email at the end of the day, emphasizing that “At this moment the Public Prosecutor’s Office has “no comment”.”

StMaartenNews.com also contacted MP Heyliger and asked whether the prosecutor’s office had their sights trained on him again. Heyliger merely had the following statement to give: “Part of my life, part of my legacy.”