Dear Editor,
Okay, let me ask this because all night I scratching my head and it’s not from dandruff. What experience do 90 per cent of these people on slates have in association with political runnings? How many of them have been mayor, etcetera in their communities? How many of them have worked in the legal sector to know the law, bylaws, constitution, preamble, etc. of the country? How many of them have run a major organization with an input and output of large funds?
Look, I even hear people tonight with no SXM accent at all; that without knowing I can guess they have no idea about the real grit and grassroots of SXM. Where the hell they finding all these bring-come-from? Come to hell on man, now they making a mockery of our country, its people, our survivability, and it isn’t a damn joking matter to me no more.
We say bring young blood into the system for change, but we didn’t say bring clueless, have no concepts of what the hell is happening or should be happening every fly-by-night joe. It seems to me most of these parties just went out on the streets recruiting and if the majority of people they talked to knew their ABCs they were put on their party slate.
Really party leaders? This is some bullshit and you all causing a lot more mistrust and anxiety amongst the people. This election, first off, should be to vote out every doggone person who ever jumped ship causing government to fall, they the first that should only get the most 5 votes (Theirs, spouse, parents, children, and side-thing), even their siblings shouldn’t be voting for them. The next group to get 5 votes should be all the old political leaders, if you served more than 5 years in the past, you should get no vote, time to clean house.
The next to go is any who have proven to the people they are incompetent, and have no clue what is left from right. If you can’t articulate your views and thoughts to the people effectively, no vote. I am not saying you have to have a large vocabulary, what I am saying is this; if you are speaking to the people on an 8th grade level, then dammit, you better sound like Martin Luther King doing so. Sound like you have a lick of sense in your head, and a clue. Buy a vowel or something.
I know elections is a time for us to do our little campaign beat up, but this dog and pony circus show of these parties has got to stop. It’s time for the people to stop this crap, our sons, daughters, nieces, nephews, grandparents can’t afford for us to allow this death by political meditated murder, and suicide to continue.
If you are coming out to the people as someone who wants to represent them, then by goodness dress the flipping part. The mockery I am seeing now is making me gnash my teeth. It’s all fun and games until someone gets hurt in this political career debacle. If this is the mockery now, that tells me we aren’t getting anywhere further after September.
This pilot of a political made-for-TV reality disaster show tells me when the season gets here it will be the same fuggery happening.
Carrol Burgundy-Benders
Dear Editor,
Please allow me to ask Minister Lee, publicly, to release the financing details of his newly proposed medical centre. While the contract was awarded to the lowest bidder that does not necessarily mean that ownership will cost the least amount of money.
The financing terms will illustrate the true cost of this project to the taxpayers of this island.
In this day and age of 1to 1.5 per cent interest rates on the open money market, any financing rate over 2.5 per cent APR would be a rip-off. Case in point; US $60 million at 2.5 per cent, over 20 years will cost us the taxpayers a total of $76 million over the life of the loan while 6.5 per cent over 20 years will cost $107 million or $31 million in additional interest charges.
So, I ask Minster Lee to please publish the financing terms of INSO for the sake of Transparency, as the Devil is always in the details.
Name withheld at author’s request.
Dear Editor,
A recent letter by an MP in your Saturday publication drew our interest. The board of the United St. Maarten Party (US Party) has a simple message it would like to share with the people of St. Maarten, as it pertains to leadership and the role of Members of Parliament. It is noteworthy that a political party has included MP’s on their list, who only underscore the party’s lack of leadership by clearly demonstrating that they too do not understand the expectations of their constituents.
Every MP, we are sure, understands the importance of the so-called “arms-length” approach when it comes to Ministers being given the space to execute their tasks. Every citizen, however, also expects his or her MP’s to ensure that assurances given to the public are honoured. This means simply that MP’s, who are elected by the people to improve their quality of life, must ensure that Ministers are fulfilling the mandate given to the MP’s by the people.
It’s called leadership, not political intervention as the MP recently wrote. Leadership in our system is not defined as getting elected to Parliament, appointing Ministers, and then never ensuring that the people are truly taken care of. An MP who prefers to quote regulations and use that as an excuse as to why the people’s business isn’t being taken care of, does not understand his or her role as an MP to always put people first. After a while, the only thing that comes from talking is sound. There will be a point when the people expect you and the Ministers who are appointed by you, to act.
Taking veiled political jabs is one thing, but implying that police officers are politically impressionable and corruptible is quite another. You are definitely not a leader if you casually imply that any of our civil servants, in particular those in law enforcement, can’t execute their jobs effectively, and in an unbiased manner, if they know a particular MP and Minister with affiliation to a particular party has made sure that a promise made to them, is a promise kept. This is an insult to the men and women in blue.
Moreover, for an MP to state that “each citizen has the right to have confidence in law enforcement, knowing that it should be impartial and fair” is tantamount to telling citizens that if their party affiliation is different, they cannot trust a police officer to act on their behalf, if the police officer and his or her colleagues receive the tools they need to fight crime from a Minister associated with a particular party. This is an extremely dangerous and irresponsible statement for an MP to make.
The MP continued by stating: “Once that stigma of politics is placed or the affiliation with a political party, then that confidence is broken and Lady Justice no longer wears the role of applying equal justice to all.” Now we are very aware that the MP has some challenges keeping her word, which is definitely not her bond, but we are very confident that our police officers do not see political colours when they put their lives on the line every day.
They deserve more respect than having an MP put to question their professionalism. Officers were denied of their rightful positions for quite some time under the party the MP now represents. The US Party assumed responsibility for the Ministry of Justice in February of this year and boldly said enough was enough. Let’s take care of our people. There is more work to be done, but we have delivered. We stepped in and didn’t look at anyone’s names or party colour. We looked at the fact that they are our people who risk their lives for us every day.
Instead of congratulating the officers, the MP thought it more important to grind a political axe and decorate it in concern for "separation of powers". The MP and the party she represents clearly prioritize vindictive practices, politics, and then people……in that order.
It is even more ironic that the MP would speak about “political influence” when the same MP is famous for vehemently defending the Minister she was responsible for in the not too distant past, as if she were actually sitting in the Minister’s chair. When you lack leadership or leadership skills, and folks already know your “word” is meaningless, you need to be careful not to add “hypocrite” to the laundry list of descriptions.
The Board of the United St. Maarten Party (US Party)
Dear Editor,
There’s a company I was working for. Now I’m no longer with this company. But the company is a good company. But the people in the company are hypocrites. They tend to laugh with you and smile with you, but on the outer end they give you the run-around, just like what they did with Jesus.
Do you know when you work with a company too long you tend to feel comfortable, and also you think the company is yours? But it’s not. So I’m just sending this message out for a few of the housekeeping staff. They know who they are. It starts like this: Great people talk about great ideas. Average people talk about things. This is the bomb, small people talk about other people.
So never hang around small people, because you can’t ever learn anything from them. They have a lot of small-minded people in housekeeping, they know who they are.
Name withheld at author’s request.
Dear Editor,
Please allow me some space in your newspaper to address the St. Maarten electorate.
Sint Maarten, let’s not be distracted!! Let us take our eyes off the regular, mundane political nit-picking, kleptocracy and nepotism that is taking place in our Island for a moment, and let us look to the future with objective eyes to see what is coming.
If we continue to overlook and neglect the bigger picture, St. Maarten will end up like many other nations that have turned a blind eye to the realities of their present state and have ended up forfeiting the bright future that is to be had by developing a progressive vision for the nation. Let us not wait for a disaster to bring us together as a people.
As it stands, we are susceptible to acts of terror, inflation, poverty, civil unrest, epidemics and bomb threats. The truth is that we have failed to enforce proper security measures to ensure the safety of our people and those visiting our friendly island. Let me ask the question: How safe are we?
How do you inject hope in a hopeless community; how do you lift up the heads of St. Maarteners who feel betrayed by their own government. Our problems are plenty and we are facing an uncertain future: governmentally, economically, socially, financially and spiritually. The one thing we know is that we need the next government to emulate: forgiveness, tolerance, love and altruism, which is putting the needs of the people above your own!!
Let us put our energy to fighting for the people of St. Maarten and not each other. All the people of St. Maarten really want from those postulating themselves for the upcoming election is HEART! You cannot lead who you do not love!! St. Maarten people are smart people, they know who is only talking the talk, and who is walking the walk!!
St. Maarten: elect “true representation”, namely people who will serve you for a change!! “True representation, is when one man can tell another man’s story with the same passion and heart“
Tell them Mully say so!!
Mulrose Rogers-Toulon
Candidate for St. Maarten Christian Party (SMCP)
