SAM MP Franklin Meyers.
PHILIPSBURG--Soualiga Action Movement (SAM) Member of Parliament (MP) Franklin Meyers on Thursday raised the alarm of the dwindling space in cemeteries saying that existing cemeteries are between 85% and 90% full and government should “get ahead” of this looming major concern.
He made the remarks during the debate on the draft amendment of the 2024 budget in the Central Committee of Parliament.
“One of the things that I think is a looming, I don’t want to call it a threat, but a major concern – our population is about 60,000… We have more than 13,000 persons that are over the age of 60 years old and we have a problem with our cemeteries,” Meyers said.
“Our cemeteries are, I would dare to say, 85-90% filled. It’s a looming problem and we have to get ahead of it before it becomes a major crisis because we will find ourselves in a position having to make the hard decisions and there is a saying, which I would like to believe is a Frankie Meyers saying, ‘if you do not make the hard decisions when you have to, you will be forced to make them when you don’t want to’.”
United People’s (UP) MP Omar Ottley also weighed in on the issue saying this had been an existing concern since he had been in executive office. “The cemetery... This has been a cry even from even during our tenure to try and find more land space because one thing that is inevitable is death,” said Ottley. “… These are things that I say we got to be very careful in what we are doing because right now there is barely any space.”
