Dear Editor,
I was told that the way I write about members of Parliament is as if I expect all of them to be lawyers. I started to answer him, but I changed my approach and asked him, “What papers do you have?” “But I went away to study.” "Why?" “Because I wanted to be an architect.” “So you are comfortable with someone with no kind of an education deciding whether the drawings, layout and measurements for a building are correct?” “But they have advisers.” “But who has the last say?”
When he shook his shoulders I said to him, “If you are an architect I believe you have a certain level of education, and you had to spend some sleepless nights studying. Do you still think that my way of writing is putting too much pressure on our members of Parliament?” His answer was, “Everybody have their way of looking at things?”
Then I asked him if he had read that a whole lot of police officers left the force and more are leaving to go work as police officer in other parts of the kingdom. He told me that they are not from here. I do not know who is who, but I am more and more convinced of what I was thinking. These do not take being a police officer to heart. And somewhere I Timothy 6:10 crossed my mind. So my question now to all members of government: how serious are they taking this step by the police and what are they going to do about it? Are they going to pack their bundle and leave and go or are they ready to deal with the brunt of it in a mature and responsible way?
This concerns the safety of the whole country, so let us see if there are solutions for all of those faults that they were finding.
I Googled the word “deserter” and it says “a member of the armed forces who deserts.” Over the years many police officers have left the police force of the Netherland Antilles in their prime, but like I mentioned over the years, not en bloc at one time. The history behind the recruitment of several of those police officers awakens the thought that “when you do not do much to get something you do not value it.” And I know that the present Minister of Justice definitely did not have a hand in recruiting those who left. And please, we do not need a quick fix.
While we are at it, let me state this. Unless the justice workers continue not to be satisfied, I believe that it would be expedient if in case the justice money problem is resolved and they are being paid, for the Minister of Justice to publicise this. Even though I am convinced that St. Maarteners born and raised in St. Maarten should spend at least four to five years away from St. Maarten at the beginning of their career, I will state what my father always reminded me: “Home is the place where even though you grumble the most, you are treated the best.”
Russell A. Simmons
