Dear Editor,
Well. Just when you think you’ve seen it all in St. Maarten politics you learn something new every day. And every day there is somebody from the old guard getting exposed about how they built their wealth on the backs of the people of St. Maarten. Years and years of self-enrichment allowed by people who kept voting them back into office over and over again.
The latest hypocrite is former Commissioner and former Minister of Finance Michael Ferrier. Mr. Do No Wrong, Mr. Holier-Than-Thou, Mr. Clean … yeah, right. Michael Ferrier, if the reports are proven to be true, reportedly has not paid government one cent, not a nickel, niet een gulden, for long lease land that his boatyard company operates on. Reportedly, the amount is somewhere in the area of NAf. 1.5 million guilders. On top of that, it is reported that Ferrier and his business partner Jeff Boyd are pressuring government to extend the long lease right another 12 years!
So wait a minute, let me understand this straight. First you reportedly deprive the people of St. Maarten and St. Maarten itself of over a million guilders that could have been used on vital services. You didn’t pay for the long lease! That is equivalent to tax evasion is it not? So, you didn’t pay anything for umpteen years, but now you want government to extend your lease? That’s like me not paying rent for my apartment for 10 years and then asking the landlord to extend me another 3 years anyway. It’s plain out immoral and wrong.
Worse yet, Ferrier was recently the Minister of Finance. A Minister of Finance who climbed on a pulpit every week talking about people who don’t pay taxes and other fees that government desperately needed. All while you are talking through one side of your face, you knew on the other side you were one of these people. Talk about hypocritical and immoral behavior. It is truly very sad.
All of this from a man who has a history of trying to destroy people’s lives by penning letters to the editor about things he had half information on but passing judgement like God Almighty. We can recall Louis Constant Fleming and his foolish vendetta against now MP Rolando Brison and an old baseless case at Winair. Winair the company didn’t even speak, but there was Ferrier again, Mr. Superior, passing judgement trying to ruin people’s lives.
Government should never grant that extension because of the precedent it will set and the Pandora’s box it will open. Government already told Ferrier and his partners to vacate the premises and they should do so immediately. If not he should get the same treatment Lee’s Roadside Grill received. Call in the heavy equipment and rake the whole place.
No matter how Ferrier tries to spin this, and believe me he will, he will play victim and record a cute li’l NAPA commercial for us. But none of it will absolve him of one very very clear fact: He didn’t pay his long lease fees and cost the government of St. Maarten and by extension the people of St. Maarten necessary funds. A clear legal offence. You cannot spin that fact.
Raoul Nicolaas
