PHILIPSBURG--The Marcel Gumbs Cabinet will resign from office when the full Cabinet, including Governor Eugene Holiday, meets at the Governor’s office on Wednesday. The cabinet’s resignation will be followed immediately by the Governor affixing his signature to the national decree to dissolve Parliament and hold snap elections, possibly in 90 days.
The national decree will be co-signed by Prime Minister Marcel Gumbs.
The Governor is expected to request that the Cabinet members stay as the country’s “caretaker” Government until “formateur” National Alliance (NA) leader Member of Parliament William Marlin can deliver his final report on the Ministers who will represent the Coalition of Eight in Parliament.
The Governor gave Marlin the task to form an Interim Government on Thursday. That Government has been tasked with completing the 2016 budget, effecting electoral reform and preparing for the snap elections.
The Cabinet of the Coalition of Eight, once in place, will remain in office until the appointment of a new cabinet based on the result of the upcoming elections.
The current Cabinet already has advised the Civil Registry and Electoral Council to prepare for elections, which will mark the second time the country will go to the polls in just over a year.
The Gumbs Cabinet said in a press statement on Friday it “sincerely hopes” the path taken “will produce the stability our young country needs.”
St. Maarten, only in its fifth year as a country within the Dutch Kingdom, is about to see the installation of its fifth cabinet in that time.
The current Cabinet and the Coalition of Eight in Parliament have been at loggerheads since September 30 when the Coalition of Eight passed a motion of no confidence against the Marcel Gumbs Cabinet supported by the United People’s (UP) party-led coalition. That motion triggered the Cabinet’s submission of a draft national decree to dissolve Parliament and call snap elections.
The impasse between the legislative branch and the executive branch of government continued to snowball until Friday’s announcement by the Cabinet that it would resign.
The Cabinet had held its stance that the Governor must sign the dissolution decree first and then the Ministers would resign. However, the Governor urged the Cabinet on Wednesday to resign and thereafter he “shall” sign the decree to bring an end to the country’s second Parliament after it has sat for just over one year.
When the current Cabinet resigns, none of the Ministers will have been in office for a year. Five of the Ministers have been in office in the current setup since December 19, 2014, while Ministers Rafael Boasman and Ernest Sams have been in their chairs just over a month.
