It turns out the Kingdom Council of Ministers approved coronavirus-related financial assistance to the tune of 20.5 million Netherlands Antillean guilders for St. Maarten in its meeting on May 1, the same day Aruba was afforded its second tranche (see Saturday paper). This was revealed by Prime Minister and Emergency Operations Center (EOC) Chairperson Silveria Jacobs while answering questions during Wednesday’s Central Committee of Parliament meeting on the COVID-19 pandemic.
This zero-per-cent-interest loan is to continue executing the Stimulus Support Relief Program (SSRP) that includes, among other things, payroll subsidies to prevent mass layoffs and business closures. The local government was able to start with NAf. 44 million in recently received liquidity support pending since 2019 after deducting the cost of prisoners from the island housed in Dutch jails from the original sum of NAf. 50.2 million.
Of course, neither that nor last Friday’s amount come close to the NAf. 254 million requested for a three-month period. And while more disbursements will be possible, they are likely to come with strict conditions set in The Hague.
It doesn’t appear the three Dutch Caribbean countries have much choice but to meet those requirements, because without help from the Netherlands they will find it very difficult to get through the coming months until their tourism economies can sufficiently recover from this unprecedented global crisis. No matter how you look at it, in both the public and private sectors on these islands belt-tightening is going to be the new order of the day.
