Civil Servants set to discuss
Kingdom laws, target date
PHILIPSBURG--The Consensus Kingdom Laws on the Financial Supervisory Committee CFT and the Prosecutor’s Office, as well as the feasibility of the December 15 target date for constitutional change, will be topics of debate this week in the Netherlands.
Preparations will also be made for a political consultation with all Kingdom partners to be held in St. Maarten in April.
Civil servants, members of the Finance and Justice and Constitutional Affairs workgroups, will be in the Netherlands this week to discuss the several issues.
Constitutional Affairs project director Dennis Richardson told The Daily Herald the Finance project group would de discussing the Consensus Kingdom Law on the CFT which will be in place during the transition period.
The project group will also discuss the establishing of the Government Credit Bank from which the new countries Curaçao and St. Maarten will be able to access loans.
The Project Group on Justice and Constitutional Affairs will continue to discuss the Consensus Kingdom Law on the Prosecutor’s Office and on the new legislation for the Police Force.
These meetings will pursue the conclusions reached during the political consultation held in Curaçao on February 16. Agreements in principle were reached on the Prosecutor’s Office and having only one Attorney General, but the Council of State still has to give advice on the authority for the Dutch minister to give instructions to the Attorney General for the Dutch Caribbean.
Other members of the St. Maarten delegation will be advisors Eugene Holiday and Richard Gibson, Island Secretary Joane Dovale-Meit and head of the Finance Department Hiro Shigemoto.
The directing group on constitutional affairs will also be in the Netherlands this week. The feasibility of attaining country status by December 15 this year will be the group’s main topic of discussion.
Dutch civil servants have already submitted a note in which they have proposed December 2010 as the feasible date for the relevant constitutional changes granting separate status to Curaçao and St. Maarten to take effect.
Constitutional Affairs Minister Roland Duncan said the note still had to be discussed in the directing group before it could possibly reach the political level.
Prime Minister of the Netherlands Antilles Emily de Jongh-Elhage, according to an article published on March 8 in the La Prensa newspaper in Curaçao, stated that if the Netherlands Antilles wanted everything to be ready, the December 15 target date would be too soon.
The directing group for constitutional affairs will make the necessary preparations for the political consultation to be held in St. Maarten in April. During that political consultation a political and final decision will be taken on whether December 15 this year is still feasible as the date for Curaçao and St. Maarten to attain their new status.
