THE HAGUE--In complying with the wishes of the Second Chamber of the Dutch Parliament, the Dutch government has invited Aruba, Curaçao and St. Maarten to establish a work group to identify the exact responsibilities within the Kingdom.
During the plenary handling of the Kingdom Disputes Law on July 4, the Second Chamber unanimously adopted the motion of Ronald van Raak of the Socialist Party (SP), which was co-signed by eight other Members of Parliament, including one from Curaçao and one from Aruba.
In this motion, the governments of the Netherlands, Aruba, Curaçao and St. Maarten are requested to engage in talks to give further content to the responsibilities of the individual countries and the Kingdom as a whole.
The motion argued that decisions of the Kingdom government regularly led to disputes with the countries and that in these disputes, the differences in interpretation of the Kingdom Charter often played a role.
State Secretary of Home Affairs and Kingdom Relation Raymond Knops has given follow-up to this motion and has asked the prime ministers of Aruba, Curaçao and St. Maarten to set up a joint work group, in which on a civil servant level, the bottlenecks can be identified and a process established.
Knops stated in a letter he sent to the Second Chamber on Wednesday that he intended to move forward with the execution of the Van Raak motion, considering the fact that “the division of responsibilities within the Kingdom is a prominent theme in the political discussions about the Kingdom.”
Because, as the motion itself also expressed, the support of the Dutch Caribbean countries is needed in this process, Knops has approached the prime ministers. The State Secretary promised to inform the Second Chamber as soon as he heard from the prime ministers.
Explaining why he had tabled the motion in July, Van Raak said that in order to prevent conflict it was important to clarify who is responsible for what in the Kingdom. “Conflicts often arise because it is not clear who is responsible for what. I see the decision of the State Secretary to get moving with this as a sign of goodwill – that the Dutch government wants to execute the motion of the Second Chamber as soon as possible,” Van Raak said.
The July 4 motion was co-signed by Member of the Aruba Parliament Rocco Tjon of the MEP party and Member of the Curaçao Parliament and now-Minister of Economic Development Giselle Mc William of the MAN party. Six Members of the Second Chamber co-signed the motion: André Bosman (VVD), Chris van Dam (CDA), Antje Diertens (D66), Attje Kuiken (PvdA), Nico Drost (ChristianUnion) and Roelof Bisschop (SGP).
