The country again faces a political crisis. Two of the United Democrats/St. Maarten Christian Party (SMPC) coalition’s parliamentarians resigned to become ministers before the credentials of their successors could be approved.
That was supposed to happen Friday, but with only six members present there was no quorum required for the meeting to do so. This in effect means the newly installed Leona Marlin II Cabinet currently lacks majority legislative support.
It was correctly stated that there is no example of this in the country’s constitutional history, but something similar occurred in Curaçao in January 2017. The newly-formed MAN/PAR/PNP/PS coalition called a meeting to approve the credentials of seven successors for elected representatives who had been appointed to the Hensley Koeiman Cabinet.
The MFK-led opposition did sign in to provide a quorum, but demanded that correspondence they had sent in claiming a new majority with nine of the remaining 14 seats be handled first. Following a shouting match back and forth, Interim President Humphrey Davelaar (PNP) called in the police and had both MFK leader Gerrit Schotte and “Kòrsou di Nos Tur” leader Amparo dos Santos removed, after which the rest of the opposition followed suit.
The credentials were then approved and Governor Lucille George-Wout subsequently swore in the new parliamentarians. Former St. Maarten Parliament General Secretary Franklin Hanze at the time agreed, saying Curaçao’s legislature consisted of 21 and not 14 seats, so the installation of seven additional members could not lawfully be stopped.
It seems the outcome in St. Maarten now to a degree depends on what the opposition fractions of NA and US Party want. Certainly, the prospect of yet another early election so soon after the last one in dire post-Hurricane Irma circumstances is hardly an attractive one.
The incoming government is already the seventh since country status was obtained on 10-10-10, almost one per year. That may be short of a world record, but it’s not exactly a hallmark of stability in the public sector either.
