A NAf. 75 million bond “that never was” led to quite a bit of commentary in society, with some speaking of a debacle. The Netherlands asking to withdraw it and follow the “correct and legitimate decision-making” procedure should not come as a big surprise after the Committee for Financial Supervision CFT declared this move to raise COVID-19 emergency funds via the Central Bank unlawful.
Finance Minister Ardwell Irion argued that the statutory restrictions mentioned applied only to capital loans, but State Secretary of Home Affairs and Kingdom Relations Raymond Knops offered a four-week postponement on the repayment of an earlier so-called “bullet loan” of NAf. 50 million that was due today, Wednesday. This, he said would allow St. Maarten to meet pending conditions for the – already received – second tranche of liquidity support, so consultations can take place on a third tranche and structural solution for the maturing loan.
Refinancing of the latter has recently been requested and was reportedly to be placed on the agenda of the Kingdom Council of Ministers for next week Friday. Hopefully by then progress will have been made on complying with the remaining requirements too.
One could thus also look at this matter in a positive way because parties at least appear to be talking to – instead of at – each other again. The bond announcement, ill-advised or not, may yet turn out to have been a kind of icebreaker between Philipsburg and The Hague.
That is the relationship most inhabitants of the island and particularly those working in the private sector still look to as the best option for getting through this unprecedented coronavirus-related crisis. If ultimately the goal on both sides remains to succeed rather than fail, agreements which benefit the local population both short- and long-term should be possible.
