Next week’s hosting of a Parliamentary Contact Plan Presidium meeting between Suriname, Curaçao, Aruba and St. Maarten, followed by a tripartite consultation among the latter three (see related story) comes at an opportune moment. To start, during the past months both the government and monarch of the Netherlands have apologised for its slave trade history.
As a matter of fact, 2023 marks 160 years (150 in practice for Suriname) since the abolition of slavery in the former Dutch colonies. Funding has been made available for related projects and it would be good to discuss how this trend is being given more content with the elected representatives visiting from Paramaribo.
As for the three Dutch Caribbean countries, agenda points of their gathering include inter-island air traffic, use of Kingdom Consensus Laws, the Kingdom Dispute Regulation, healthcare, tax systems and poverty alleviation. Those are no doubt important topics, but a current “hot potato” might be worth adding.
The Netherlands refinanced its COVID-19 liquidity support given to each at a significantly different interest rate, which it says has to do with greater risk. St. Maarten is paying 3.4%, Curaçao 5.1% and Aruba 6.9%.
The latter two are in that position because they respectively declined a separate loan to safeguard the ENNIA pensions at the last minute and refuse to anchor their financial supervision in a Consensus Kingdom Law. Seen by many as punishment, this has not gone down well particularly in Willemstad and Oranjestad.
Some even described it as so-called “divide and rule” tactics, raising the question whether lack of unity is not what allowed such, in addition to budgetary issues. The pandemic also clearly increased the islands’ dependence on the Netherlands out of pure necessity and moving forward together on dealing with this reality certainly seems a sensible approach.
There is strength in numbers.
