That caretaker State Secretary of Home Affairs and Kingdom Relations BZK Raymond Knops plans to continue with the current draft bill for a Kingdom Dispute Regulation (see related story) despite reservations of the three Dutch Caribbean countries is not the worst thing in the world. After all, discussions on this matter date back to before the constitutional reforms per 10-10-10 and continuing to argue about it forever does not make a whole lot of sense either.
Curaçao, Aruba and St. Maarten point out that the law proposal does not fully honour what was agreed on with the Netherlands during the Inter-Parliamentary Kingdom Consultations IPKO. The Dutch Second Chamber in The Hague nevertheless approved it.
The main issue is that decisions by the independent tribunal which is to settle conflicts of a strictly legal nature in question will not be binding as intended. However, at Aruba’s suggestion a related special kingdom disputes department is being set up at the Council of State.
While the latter’s rulings are not binding for the Kingdom Council of Ministers either, the advice will be followed as a point of departure, according to Knops. It will be interesting to see how that works out with the same Council of State’s objections against the current plan for a much-debated Caribbean Reform and Development Entity COHO that is to supervise implementation of a “country package” with restructuring measures as condition for more liquidity support.
At any rate, a new coalition government should soon take office in the Netherlands and there is no clarity yet whether the state secretary’s CDA party will be part of that or – if so – what ministerial portfolios it would get. In the outgoing Rutte Cabinet BZK Minister Kajsa Ollongren was from D-66, but the state sectary of CDA ended up handling Kingdom Relations practically on his own.
Perhaps this “separation of tasks” can be avoided going forward, because what good is it to have a minister who cannot get politically involved?
