PHILIPSBURG – For the time being the Central Voting Bureau (CVB) does not see a role for itself in assessing the right of United St. Maarten party (USp) leader Frans Richardson to his seat in Parliament. CVB-chairman Jason Rogers met with the chair of Parliament, MP Sarah Wescot-Williams, to discuss the situation last week.
Rogers told stmaartennews.com that the CVB relies on information obtained from the administration of the census office. “That information is supposed to be correct and Mr. Richardson is registered there,” he said. “It is not our task to check whether all candidates that are registered at the census office are factually living here. It is impossible to check whether all candidates are living on the address they provide.”
“My preliminary opinion is that there is no task here for the Central Voting Bureau for the time being,” Rogers said. “Currently Mr. Richardson has been sworn in as a member of Parliament.”
Members of Parliament have to be residents of St. Maarten according to article 49 of the Constitution. The national ordinance registration and finances political parties defines in article 1 ‘residents’ as “those who have factually residence in St. Maarten.”
Two events have established that MP Richardson is living on an address on the French side. On February 14, the anti-corruption taskforce did a search at Richardson’s house in Saint Martin, it appears from a press release issued by the prosecutor’s office at the time.
Richardson is a suspect in two investigations: Squid and Emerald. The first investigation deals with vote buying during the 2016 elections; the second probe is about membership of a criminal organization, taking bribes to the tune of $370,000 and tax fraud.
When the courier of a local law office recently attempted to delver documents for Richardson at the address where he is registered at the census office – Orchid Drive #2 – the residents told him that the parliamentarian does not live there.
Article 49 of the Constitution furthermore states in paragraph 3 that membership of Parliament expires after an uninterrupted stay abroad of eight months or longer; that article will obviously not disqualify Richardson because he is regularly on the Dutch side.
Parliament’s chair Wescot-Williams did not immediately react to our question as to which – if any – line of action she has in mind.
Photo caption: Attorney Jason Rogers, chairman of the Central Voting Bureau. Photo Hilbert Haar.
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