Dear Editor,
I submit this letter to the people of St. Maarten through your daily paper. On Friday, March 19, I read a letter written by former minister of finance of St. Maarten Perry Geerlings addressed to Mr. Peter C. Choharis of the Choharis Law Group, PLLC, in Washington. In his letter, Mr Geerlings stated that the 12 Members of Parliament who submitted the petition do not represent him, and the country cannot be bound by obligations that those 12 Members of Parliament might have entered into.
I have a few questions for the former minister who is also a former member of parliament.
1) When you were a member of parliament, who did you represent? Yourself only? Or all the people of St. Maarten?
2) If 12 of the 15 members of parliament do not represent you, nor the people of St. Maarten as you mentioned in your letter, then why do we adhere to laws and legislations approved by parliament? After all, according to you, they do not represent you.
3) Why do the people of St. Maarten go to the polls to elect members of parliament who, according to you, do not represent them? Are you suggesting that the people are just wasting their time? Did they waste their time when they elected you into parliament?
4) If the members of parliament do not represent the people of St. Maarten, then who do they represent?
Mr. Geerlings, if you do not agree with the petition, just say so. That is your right. But to say that the members of parliament do not represent you, nor the people of St. Maarten, is an irresponsible statement, and you should retract it.
You stated that the 12 members of parliament do not represent you, but yet, you as a regular citizen, take the liberty to speak on behalf of the people of St. Maarten. You do not have that right.
If you wrote your letter on your own personal behalf, you are demonstrating that you are a lawless citizen who has no intentions of adhering to the laws or regulations approved by parliament, as they do not represent you. You are clearly saying to the people of St. Maarten that they should never vote for you, because you, as a member of parliament, will not represent them.
Fernando R. Clark
