Unbiased look at the Sint Maarten Elections
PHILIPSBURG--Justice Minister Dennis Richardson minced no words when he issued a call to the Dutch Government and anti-St. Maarten fractions in the Second Chamber of the Dutch Parliament "to put the facts on the table" if they exist about the continuous, but so far baseless claims about St. Maarten being controlled by the "underworld."
Richardson was in the St. Maarten Parliament Friday, along with Prime Minister Marcel Gumbs, to discuss the draft law to establish an integrity chamber for the council. The law was tabled in Parliament on Wednesday in a Central Committee meeting. That meeting resumed on Friday, and will now continue today, Monday, at 10:00am in Parliament House.
Dutch Minister for Interior and Kingdom Relations Ronald Plasterk "adheres to the view of an upper and down world [as written]" on St. Maarten, but he and others in the Netherlands, who continue to parrot this line, fail to provide any proof, Richardson said.
The Wit-Samson integrity report looked into the perception about St. Maarten being controlled by underworld crime elements, and found nothing to support this claim. Nothing was also found to support this claim in the similar PricewaterhouseCoopers report, commissioned by the Dutch Government via instruction to Governor Eugene Holiday.
If there is proof of this connection, the Dutch Government should put it on the table and not allude to it, Richardson said.
