Council approves new articles
of incorporation for SMHDF
PHILIPSBURG--The Island Council approved new articles of incorporation for St. Maarten Housing Development Foundation (SMHDF) on Thursday. The National Alliance voted against the proposal tabled by the Executive Council.
NA’s major reason for voting against had to do with the authority the Commissioner in charge of Housing has to convene meetings of the supervisory board and management of the Housing Foundation. Commissioner Roy Marlin, who took the responsibility of the portfolio in absence of Commissioner Theo Heyliger, said there was nothing wrong with this authority and that it was standard procedure.
Heyliger is recovering from surgery and has not gone back to work yet. NA Island Council Members Hyacinth Richardson and Rodolphe Samuel also weren’t present at the meeting.
It is government’s task to look after proper housing for its citizens and to this effect the Commissioner has a advisory voice within the foundation and can convene meetings to advise about government’s policy on social housing.
However, NA Councilman William Marlin said that if government requested a meeting, the foundation would not deny such meeting and giving the Commissioner the authority to convene meetings would in fact make the Commissioner a member of the board.
Another reason for the NA to vote against the articles was that a Central Committee meeting had been held several weeks ago to discuss the draft articles of incorporation.
Both Marlin and George Pantophlet requested the minutes of that meeting because, according to them, the notary firm Alexander and Simon that drafted the new articles of incorporation had agreed to make certain changes, including the wording on the Commissioner’s authority to convene meetings. However, the Island Council never received a copy of the changes made, Marlin said.
Commissioner Marlin said he had checked with the Secretariat of the Island Territory and understood that as no decision had been taken that changes would be made, the notary firm had not seen it necessary to make changes.
Marlin gave an extensive explanation why the change of the SMHDF articles of incorporation was needed. SMHDF had requested Deloitte and Touche in 2003 to produce a report on the financial performance of the foundation. The report concluded that of a total of NAf. 5.4 million gross income, 75 per cent went to cost of financing and cost of depreciation.
“Under these circumstances it was almost impossible to have a financially healthy foundation. Therefore it was recommended to initiate negotiations with the Dutch authorities to re-examine and to re-negotiate the conditions of financing that had been done through the intervention of the Dutch Participation Company Netherlands Antilles NPMNA,” he said.
A finalisation agreement was concluded with NPMNA in April/May 2006 entailing that the foundation would conclude a commercial loan with FirstCaribbean International Bank to pay a sum of NAf. 22.5 million to NPMNA to pay back the commercial loan of NAf. 33.5 million and a soft loan of NAf. 7.1 million.
By doing so SMHDF could have a financial gain of NAf. 18.1 million in the settlement of the original loan package. It also was agreed that SMHDF with the assistance of the Island Government of St. Maarten would implement the recommendations made in the report of Alexander and Simon with respect to the assessment of the application of corporate governance in SMHDF that was presented in August 2005.
The recommendations made in the report had to do with matters such as a complete revision of the 1997 “Performance Agreement” between the island Territory and SMHDF, the housing foundation’s obligation to submit yearly audit figures, limiting the number of board members to a maximum of five compared to seven as now is the case, stipulating specific profiles for each board member, that the Executive Council has the binding appointment of three of the five board members and, finally, changing the management structure through the proposed changes of the articles of incorporation of the foundation, whereby the model of the foundation was to be modified from a directive of Board of Directors model to a Supervisory Board model.
The SMHDF board has unanimously approved the amendments in the articles of incorporation, Marlin said.
