Dear Editor,

I don't usually do too much writing during the political campaigning on Sint Maarten, which since

10-10-'10 has been a record-setting amount in the Netherlands Antilles or if I should say it differently, the Dutch Kingdom. I am stating this because what Stoker wrote to you did not sit right with me. I looked up the word "stoker" and it is explained the same in English as in Dutch." A person who tends the furnace on a steamship or steam train. In this case a person who is throwing gasoline on the fire.

I have this question. What can be made of a person who throws stones and hides his/her hand? My father would tell us that makes that person a coward, because that person is not man enough to face the consequences of his/her deeds, but that person has also decided beforehand, that the person who he/she is throwing the stones at will retaliate in a manner which the stone thrower is not ready to deal with. That to me falls within the definition of being a coward.

Those letters did not sit right with me simply because of the seven hundred odd people involved. I

read the letters, saw the name Stoker, and knowing the meaning of the word, I had to read them again, because this made no sense to me. If I have the ability to help more than seven hundred people, why would I be playing games about it? Is this not telling me something about Stoker's psyche? Is this sick or selfish, or is it trying to show up the Minister of Justice. I can assure Stoker that the only thing that he has done to that Minister is that it would make her feel sad to know that there are people out there who could have contributed to the process and for whatever sick reason did not make use of her open door policy.

The English translation of the Dutch saying "Dat spreekt van zelf" is "That goes without saying", but I can assure anyone this is not the case with the government. With the government there is a process for almost everything. Taking this into consideration, I do not think that Stoker is of good will. I hope that Stoker is not a potential candidate on any political list, because with people like him/her we would be jumping from the frying pan into the fire.

By the way, how many Ministers of Justice did we have before Miss Anna Richardson? What did they do for the Justice workers? If Minister Anna Richardson was not brave enough to take that bold step and take on that Heracles task to make sure that more than seven hundred Justice workers got what is due to them, who would all of these "pundits have to blame?

When I was thirteen years old, the priest at the Anglican Church at that time said to me, "Yes. Mister backseat driver". We were not in a car so I was confused but my father was my backup, so he explained to me the meaning. He also told me to try to avoid people saying that to me in the future. So, I will say here "It is easy to be a backseat driver" (De beste stuurlui staan aan wal). Would not Stoker have been a bigger person if he/she had made use of the Minister's open-door policy and brought his idea forward. I believe Stoker would have gotten a better insight on why it was taking that long, and or why Stoker's solution would or would not work and everybody would respect each other.

Hi people, we are only 60.000 on sixteen square miles, what is with this constant ridicule of each other? Before time the school children used to be an example of how people could play together; nowadays it's gang-fight almost every day among the school children. I will go out on a limb and say it is the children becoming what they see the adults doing..

I am still of the opinion that Stoker should demonstrate maturity and make use of the Minister of Justice's open-door policy.

Russell A. Simmons

Dear Editor,

Who is Stoker? We are a collective of people on St. Maarten and in the diaspora researching historic facts and backgrounds of some of today’s political problems. We realize our revelations may stir up some response and knowing the politicized society, we live in, we must withhold our actual names and will use the pen-name “Stoker”.

It takes a lot of time talking to people, digging through old documents, and searching on-line libraries to reconstruct the actual history behind some present-day problems like this one. However, we feel that what we have uncovered needs to get out. Then you decide what is true!

In part 1 we followed the history of this problem from its origins to the day of the elections on January 9, 2020. This, however, is not the end of the story.

Insiders have revealed that the Silveria Jacobs Cabinet 1 was warned that paying that advance to police officers on election day could seriously backfire. The legislation to alter the salary scales going into effect in the past wasn’t even drafted yet. It was also expected to raise many questions from the Council of Advice. Paying an advance on a law that doesn’t exist is illegal! So, drafting and getting that piece of legislation on the books post-haste was essential to brush off the “illegal” from the act, after the fact. Those many questions from the Council of Advice did indeed come. Up to this day, this piece of legislation has not passed.

We used the word “alter” the salary scales because we find the word “fixing” not fitting anymore, now we know the history of it. The unions after 10-10-10 had gotten exactly what they wanted for their members, so there is nothing broken that needed to be fixed. Mind you, at this point the issue was just about the replacing of the old salary scales of the police department only with new ones retroactively. Then fit the police officers in those new scales and pay them the difference with the salary they already had gotten since 10-10-10. This would boil down to getting one salary increment extra for most. No function book, or new legal position for the Police Department are required for that!

According to our sources the estimated cost that time was about NAf. 4 million. Of which half was already paid on election day with no taxes levied. This is already an enormous complex administrative process. Imagine going 13 years back in time. There are police officers who have left the force since that time, gone on pension, or have died.

Having cashed in his electoral votes, then-Minister of Justice Doran ran from the Justice Ministry to start wreaking havoc in the Ministry of VROMI [Public Housing, Spatial Planning, Environment and Infrastructure – Ed.]. That, however, is another story.

Instead of fixing this one issue with the police salary scales, the new Minister of Justice, Anna Richardson, decided to make it a lot more complicated and a whole lot more expensive. She added new issues to the already problematic mix. She convinced herself and the Council of Ministers, that the function book for the whole Ministry of Justice, and the entire legal position of the police should be mixed into the issue of the police salary scales. Naturally, she feels now they all must go into effect dating back to 10-10-10. However, there is absolutely no need to go back in time for other changes to the legal position of the Police Department either. The same goes for the Function Book of the entire Ministry of Justice.

Putting an upcoming payout before all the entire Ministry of Justice workers is a very expensive, purely political choice. As we learned from Minister Anna Richardson on Friday, July 14, 2023, it will cost the community more than 40 million guilders in back-pay. We wonder how many votes this buys. In the recent past we have seen politicians being convicted for buying votes, using their own money. These politicians do not use their own money, they use ours!

Stoker

Pseudonym used at author’s request.

Dear Editor,

October 10, 2023, commemorates St. Maarten obtaining the status of “country” within the Kingdom of the Netherlands. Regrettably, today there’s not a great feeling of jubilation among the general population. One main reason; most citizens have not been living a significant upward change in the quality of their lives since the decision-making powers were transferred to govern our own public affairs.

Yet a milestone it was.

The first Parliament was a blueprint for future parliamentarians to elaborate on and strengthen its relationship between citizens and elected representatives. The first four years was a marathon of public meetings to deliberate, approve, reject or amend many draft laws carried over from the former Parliament of the Netherlands Antilles. The process which is based on additional Article IV of St. Maarten’s constitution included approval of the civic and penal codes. Time was of the essence to comply with these deadlines.

This highest body of governance was never destined to be stagnant, complacent nor become a podium for grandstanding. Parliament’s crest “Coram Populo” means “In the presence of the people” was designed with the creativity and input of local high school students and unanimously approved by Parliament August 12, 2012.

It’s time to act according to the letter and the spirit of Parliament’s crest, open, timely and transparent deliberations of elected members of Parliament.

Regrettably we failed to appoint or retain staff who were or are able and capable to fill the various functions in a timely fashion based on merits instead of based on preference. Reportedly, to date many civil servants are leaving, while we struggle to appoint new and capable recruits.

These issues may have contributed a great deal to the slow pace and mediocrity of serving the people of our country. Can we continue pointing our fingers to Curaçao or to the Netherlands for our current state of affairs?

Too many of our citizens have lost hope and faith in our capability to do the right things in order to increase the quality of life and level of prosperity of our citizens. Moving forward, while there are pockets of progress, the new Parliament must, for example:

- be more empathic with the plight of our people through passing laws that reflect the improvement of the quality of life including better pension, improved and affordable healthcare

- clear backlogs of laws already in the pipeline for years including the still-pending draft criminal procedure code.

- update and reinforce building codes

- introduce stiff penalties for basket-of-goods violations.

- support and expand the powers of the ombudsman to include government-owned companies.

Entrusted by my colleagues to be at the helm of introducing a new order of things was not a “walk in the park”.

Providing leadership and structure to the first Parliament of St. Maarten was a priority. My first meeting as President of Parliament was held in the old government building. I endured and delivered confidently because I trusted in God to handle matters beyond my efforts.

October 10, 2023, should give pause to reflect on our true purpose for those seeking office for the next four years. It’s a chance to restore hope and confidence of our citizens that our young democracy deserves a chance to thrive and shall not fail future generations to come. It’s an opportunity to renew our vows honestly and truthfully to serve with dignity, accountability, openly in the presence of the people.

Gracita Arrindell

Dear Editor,

We have all heard the narrative over and over: justice workers have been wronged, and Government needs to pay them what they are owed. We have heard it so many times, most people have accepted this as being necessary. But what if we told you that narrative is wrong, or at least, it is not the whole truth, not by far.

It takes a lot of time talking to people and digging through old documents on several on-line libraries to reconstruct the actual history behind some present-day problems like this one. However, we feel that what we have uncovered needs to get out. Then you decide what is true! Who are we? We are a collective of people on St. Maarten and in the diaspora researching historic facts and backgrounds of some of today’s political problems. We realize our revelations may stir up some response. Knowing the politicized society, we live in, especially in election time, we must withhold our actual names and will use the pen-name: “Stoker”.

Like many things in our young country, the story started at its birth on 10-10-10. However, its roots are much older. For many years the Netherlands Antilles had a so-called Windward Islands Allowance for its workers that were stationed, you guessed it, on the Windward Islands. The reason was simple, the considerable higher cost of living over here. This allowance was introduced in 1972 and was set at 12%. In 1974 it was increased to 16.3% and since that time no research was done anymore to establish the actual difference in the cost of living between Curaçao and St. Maarten. We guess it was getting too expensive. The allowance stays at 16.3% until this very day.

The Island Territory of St. Maarten had established its own salary system in 1969 but hadn’t updated its salary scales regularly. So, over the years they copied the salary scales from Netherlands Antilles and added their 16.3% allowance for its own civil service in St. Maarten.

The only real problem with this system of adding allowances to a salary is the pension. Mind you, the 16.3% is real money and you must pay income tax, AOV, etc. on it as well. However, you don’t pay pension premium (to APS) on it, and so, it doesn’t count in your (APS) pension. It wasn’t until 2008 when the Island Territory of St. Maarten finally updated its own civil service salary policy and included this 16.3% in the salary, which made it count also for the APS-pension. Of course, you also had to pay 25% pension premium on it, of which 8% came out of the civil servants pay. Since this would result in a negative effect on the net salary of civil servants, Government granted an extra salary increment to compensate for that.

As of 10-10-10 the civil servants of the Netherlands Antilles that were stationed on St. Maarten became civil servants of the newly formed Country St. Maarten. The Social Charter regulated that they were to be enrolled in the St. Maarten salary system the same way the previous civil servants of the Island Territory of St. Maarten were in January 2008. Exceptions were made for those entities that had their own legal position regulated by law, such as the Police Department and the Coast Guard on their insistence. This incorporation in the St. Maarten system was done for all other so-called Justice workers. Yes, it was done for Customs, the prison, the Financial Intelligence Unit, and the part of Immigration that was not incorporated in the Police Department. It was also suggested to do so for the police, then and again in 2014.

So why were the police not included? They refused! Their unions, yes, the very same unions now advocating the opposite, were against this. Their main argument was that they wanted to keep the possibility for police people of the Leeward Islands to come and (temporarily) work here where they then would get that allowance. So, it was they themselves that wanted to stay with their old Netherlands Antilles salary system including their Windward Island Allowance. In their mind they were (and maybe still are) more closely related to the Police Department in Curaçao than to the rest of the civil service of St. Maarten. Our first Minister of Justice, Duncan, didn’t push this issue through against the will of those scary Curaçao-based unions. The NAPB for instance, still has its seat located in Willemstad, Curaçao, instead of Philipsburg, St. Maarten.

In short, the problem of the salary scales didn’t concern all Justice workers, just the Police and National Detectives. The latter group was, until 10-10-10, an integral part of the police force KPNA. Since everybody got what they wanted, the real question is, why did it become an issue in the first place? Slowly but surely more people in the police force started to realize this stance was not in their best interest (mainly the pension). And then, … politics got involved.

In the last days of the Leona Marlin Government, then-Minister of Finance Geerlings briefly also became Minister of Justice. He figured that if he promised to “fix” the salary scales and do it retroactively to 10-10-10, this would result in a nice pay-out to many of the police officers. This in turn would benefit him in the then upcoming elections of January 2020. However, he didn’t benefit, he was outmaneuvered by Minister Doran who succeeded him in November 2019 as Minister of Justice. Doran promised the police officers to pay an advance on the projected back-pay and, wait for it, paid it on the morning of election day 2020! Thus, taking the practice of vote-buying to a new level and became the biggest vote-getter. It worked.

Stay tuned for part 2!

Stoker