While the population waits for a new interim cabinet that is to prepare for early elections on February 9, several deadlines involving the Kingdom Council of Ministers continue to loom. These include the 2015 budget that still has not been approved by
the Committee for Financial Supervision CFT due to a perceived negative gap between income and expenditures, along with the also-troubled draft 2016 version.
In addition, there is the instruction to settle the considerable arrears to Social and Health Insurance SZV and General Pension Fund APS. This is a condition to postpone mandatory compensation for remaining deficits from earlier years as well.
The Integrity Chamber is in the works, although there is no final word whether the corresponding ordinance passed by the Parliament in Philipsburg has ended the Dutch Government’s threat to impose one of its own. Moreover, deployment of a large number of law enforcement officials from the Netherlands to tackle corruption and help beef up security is pending.
Of course, these are all matters the Gumbs cabinet was handling already, so they can be considered part of the “daily operations” to which a government on the way out is supposed to limit itself. Still, there might be reason for some concern whether the Minsters’ current caretaker status and prospect of being replaced over the next few weeks might not lead to costly delays.
It must be kept in mind too that once the next Council of Ministers is installed by the incoming NA/DP/USP/Lake/Matser coalition its members will need some time to study all these problems and continue working on solutions. Also, one cannot exclude the possibility that they may have their own ideas on how to go about it.
Under the circumstances, parliamentarians and public administrators in The Hague would do well to show some understanding for the impact of the recent political developments and subsequent constitutional turmoil on society in general and the local civil service that is to execute policy decisions in particular. A bit of respite to finish all the homework given to St. Maarten of late doesn’t seem unreasonable at this point.
