SXMElections.com

St. Maarten News—United People’s party (UP) member of Parliament Franklin Meyers blasted the government for what he terms a mismanagement of power company GEBE in light of the latest string of power outages on the island. “This is unbelievable! The mismanagement of GEBE goes beyond party politics. It is affecting us all; the average citizen whose appliances are being damaged, businesses that are being hurt in an already damaged economy, residents that are planning their daily household chores, and even GEBE’s own employees are all affected by the mismanagement from the top,” Meyers said in a statement.

MP Meyers further pointed out that not so long ago the current Council of Ministers wanted thirty million guilders from GEBE to balance their budget, which now already has accumulated a huge deficit in the first two quarters of the year. “They furthermore told the previous Supervisory Board to take loans for the purchase of new generators, and not to use the money that GEBE has on their account. When the previous Supervisory Board refused to play political games, they were removed. Musical chairs is being played with the CEO, CFO and COO position ever since, Meyers said.

“On social media there was a post that was funny, but sad at the same time. It reads: ‘MP Lake put the new GEBE board in place, his back to basics approach is in full effect. We’re back to candlelight”! While lots of things were running well under the UP-Led Government, the reality is that this coalition is messing up everything good. We now have a large number of power outages, we’re experiencing major issues with garbage collection and management of the dump, while a new fantasy island is being planned in the middle of our lagoon for a sewage plant,” Meyers charged.

“Enough is enough”, MP Meyers went on. “My people deserve better! We can no longer continue like this. We need to put our people first, by creating an environment where businesses can flourish and where the quality of life for everyone increases. As a Member of Parliament I will work together with all stakeholders to get St. Maarten out of this darkness, and remain committed to find sound solutions for the problems GEBE is facing,” Meyers said.