The Integrity Chamber in a letter to Prime Minister Luc Mercelina (see Wednesday newspaper) stated that persons who regularly perform services for government while also on the Council of Advice could face potential conflict-of-interest situations. It said the high council of state may be expected to take steps that safeguards its impartiality and independence.
The chamber added that the mere perception of bias among members of the advisory body for all draft laws and decrees could damage the organisations’ credibility. The latter is important considering the fact that there must be compelling reasons to deviate from its advice.
Six key actions were suggested. These regard clear policies, requiring disclosure of potential conflicts, offering training, ensuring compliance, enforcing recusance or resignation when necessary and creating anonymous complaint procedures.
It is hard to argue against the chamber’s reasoning and recommendations, as any doubt in council members’ objectivity must be avoided. However, one also needs to realise that finding suitable candidates for such sensitive functions which carry a heavy responsibility has proven no easy task.
Keep in mind that these are not full-time positions with big salaries, so the knowledgeable people involved usually require either another job or good pension. It’s obviously an honour to be asked, but demands a certain degree of selfless dedication.
The Integrity Chamber emphasised that the public sector is inherently at risk of conflicts of interest. That especially seems the case in a relatively small and young country like St. Maarten, where practically everyone is related to, knows and/or has dealings with each other.
This is part of the reason why meeting the standards mentioned can be a challenge in practice due mainly to limitations of size and scale. For one thing, more residents tend to wear different hats.
