When the controversy erupted over St. Maarten’s bid for chairmanship of the Central Bank of Curaçao and St. Maarten (CBCS) Supervisory Board of Directors with the conditional nomination of attorney Jairo Bloem for the position, Prime Minister Dr. Luc Mercelina was abroad on an official visit to the U.S. In his absence Finance Minister Marinka Gumbs and Bloem were left to pick up the pieces.
Now that he is back Mercelina has taken the high road, taking the government’s critics head-on for their questionable “crab mentality”. In his view, the country should be proud to have the chance to provide the next chairman of a key institution such as the Central Bank. We should all unite behind the candidate and applaud the Minister of Finance’s initiative after years of procrastination.
The prime minister has a point. While he did not directly mention his colleagues in Curaçao during the government’s press briefing on Wednesday, it is curious to say the least that the government in Willemstad has remained conspicuously quiet on the issue. It is also high time that a new Chairman of the supervisory board is appointed to replace the current temporary appointee. In that sense, Finance Minister Gumbs should arguably receive some applause for forcing the issue after almost a year of asking the current supervisory board for an official candidate.
But the problem is that this would set a questionable precedent outside of the clearly mandated legal steps for appointing a chairman to what is meant to be the independent and most important supervisory institution of the economic union between Curaçao and St. Maarten. Because, while the current government’s intentions might be honourable, that is not a guarantee that their successors will not turn out to be the proverbial foxes in the hen house.
And make no mistake, at this time we don’t have any reason to question the competence or integrity of attorney Bloem. There is, however, a long history of political interference in the appointment of candidates to supervisory boards of government-owned companies in St. Maarten. These candidates were often appointed to guarantee political influence rather than competent advice.
The Central Bank is simply too important an institution to risk undermining its integrity and independence with the whiff of political interference. The road to hell is often paved with good intentions.
