THE HAGUE--Political veteran Paul Rosenmöller, who is well-known in the Dutch Caribbean, has been selected as the new chairman of the Permanent Committee for Kingdom Relations of the Dutch Parliament’s First Chamber.
Rosenmöller’s appointment was announced during a First Chamber plenary debate, at which time the names of the other permanent committee chairpersons were also made public. Rosenmöller, who is a First Chamber member on behalf of green left party GroenLinks, will succeed Ruard Ganzevoort.
Rosenmöller is very familiar with the Caribbean part of the Kingdom. For several years he was a member of the then Permanent Committee for Antillean and Aruban Affairs of the Dutch Parliament’s Second Chamber.
In 2011, he was asked to preside over a committee that investigated the screening of Curaçao’s Council of Ministers, headed by then Prime Minister Gerrit Schotte. Rosenmöller’s committee concluded that the screening had not taken place according to the rules.
A First Chamber member for eight years, Ganzevoort chaired the committee of four. “It was an honour and I did it with pleasure,” he told The Daily Herald on Wednesday. He said he was now leaving the chairmanship in the hands of a very knowledgeable man with vast experience working with the islands. “He is a perfect fit for chairman.”
Ganzevoort assured that he would stay involved in kingdom relations, as he remains a committee member on behalf of GroenLinks. As such, he will be attending next week’s Inter-Parliamentary Consultation of the Kingdom IPKO.
Two others in the First Chamber’s Kingdom Relations Committee who have affinity with the islands are former democratic party D66 leader Boris Dittrich and former Second Chamber member Jeroen Recourt of labour party PvdA. First Chamber member Jeroen de Vries of the Forum for Democracy FvD has been appointed vice-chairman of the committee.
