Parliament during a plenary session on Wednesday will discuss consulting the Advisory Council on article 50 paragraphs 2 and 3 of the Constitution. It was supposed to take place last Friday but got adjourned, having originally been called as an urgent meeting for Wednesday, July 13, that did not proceed.
The Friday before that this matter was discussed in the Central Committee, after suspended Member of Parliament (MP) Claudius Buncamper sent a letter to President of Parliament Grisha Heyliger on June 3. In it, he questioned article 50 sub 2b suspending legislators when convicted of certain crimes even though – as in his case – the sentence concerned has not become irrevocable yet because there is still an appeal process underway.
St. Maarten is the only country in the Dutch kingdom with this rule that includes the temporary installation of a deputy from the party-in-question’s candidate list for the most recent election, presumably the one next in line. However, these details are not spelled out clearly, reason why United Democrats (UD) leader and then President of Parliament Sarah Wescot-Williams said since 2019 that further regulations are needed on how to apply the law.
Adding to the current controversy is what happened with the United St. Maarten Party (USP). Buncamper had left the faction before he was suspended and “his” deputy based on the electoral law is Chanel Brownbill, whose USP membership was later revoked by the current party board because of disagreement on giving content to the function.
Brownbill not only kept the seat in the name of USP but together with former USP MP Akeem Arrindell, who had also declared himself an independent member earlier, offered support to the National Alliance/United People’s Party (NA/UP) government when NA MP Ludmila Duncan resigned her NA membership and thus went independent as well. Confused? So are many voters, as this “newly expanded coalition” has still not been officially announced.
Nevertheless, suspending elected representatives in pre-trial custody or sentenced to prison itself remains useful to prevent awkward and undesirable situations especially when it involves very relevant charges like corruption.
As for limiting the authority or possibilities of deputy members, that seems like opening a whole can of worms based on the “free mandate principle” where seats in practice belong not to the political party, but to those occupying such who take an oath to exercise the office according to their conscience and must be free to do so.
