President of Parliament pushes for urgent meeting of Parliament: Agenda point: hurricane Irma

Philipsburg, St.Maarten, September 22nd,2017 —  The President of Parliament, Sarah Wescot-Williams, has convened a meeting of Parliament for September 25th at 10 am in the morning.Although the Parliament building is not functional, temporary accommodation has been secured at the new government building.

“It has been 2 weeks since the passing of hurricane Irma and it is time that the parliament takes stock of the situation our island is faced with.” The President of Parliament has already requested government to provide a state of affairs on all matters related to or affected by hurricane Irma, such as electricity and water, ports, relief, preparation, infrastructure, hospital etc..

The agenda for the meeting has been broken down as follows:

1. State of preparedness hurricane season.

2. Disaster management hurricane Irma.

3. Reconstruction following the devastation by hurricane Irma.”

“In the meantime, I have been looking at several laws, such as a guarantee fund law and a hurricane/disaster relief management law.” The Prime Minister has been invited to this meeting of parliament.Given the state of emergency, declared by the Prime Minister, he has been requested to permit the public broadcast of this  parliament meeting via radio.

“Right now, our objective should be looking beyond the immediate needs to the rebuilding of our country and our economy and securing the livelihood of our people. The time to assess our preparedness and management of the recent disaster will come.”