PHILIPSBURG--St. Maarten has begun to pay the interest on the NAf. 295 million bond issued by the Dutch Government as its part of the debt of the former Netherlands Antilles. The first half-year interest payment of NAf. 4.1 million was made in April, according to Finance Minister Hiro Shigemoto.
The interest alone will be NAf. 8.2 million annually on the bond repayment. The outstanding amount will be redeemed on October 21 of 2020, 2025, 2030, 2035 and 2040, Shigemoto said.
Deputy Prime Minister Theo Heyliger, who has come under intense criticism from some sections of the community at home and in the Netherlands for comparing the attainment of country status to modern-day slavery that has seen Dutch funding dry up and Dutch supervision increase, told The Daily Herald this was a perfect example of what he had meant.
Pointing particularly to an editorial in this newspaper, Heyliger said, "People seem to forget that we didn't get a handout. We have to repay what we were given, all based on the agreements that were made to bring home country status."
The Dutch Government, based on signed agreements, committed to paying NAf. 183 million as debt relief directly to St. Maarten, he said, adding that so far only NAf. 65 million, which covered a debt to the then-general pension fund APNA, had been paid. The APNA payment, Heyliger and Shigemoto said, was not a responsibility of the people of St. Maarten, as it was a debt incurred by the former Netherlands Antilles Government.
"With the APNA debt passed on to St. Maarten and other payments pending to creditors, our debt was estimated at NAf. 183 million. Of that amount, St. Maarten paid back some NAf. 78 million because the promised debt relief was not available in a timely fashion to pay creditors who had a time limit in their contracts or had gone to court to get payment from government," Heyliger said. "So you see, the people of St. Maarten have so far covered the majority of the country's debt."
Of the remaining direct St. Maarten debt, a "significant portion" is owed to Dutch contractors and firms. "Worldwide, this would be considered incentive for buying from that country," Heyliger said.
He also noted that government had not received any official response up to now to its letters about the shares issued for utilities company GEBE that were sent to the Dutch Government.
"The people of St. Maarten continue to subsidise the Netherlands through the Dutch public entities of St. Eustatius and Saba. Little St. Maarten is shouldering the burden for a big first-world country. When we enforce GEBE's concession to the letter, we will be viewed as taking bad ones and no one will remember the years the St. Maarten people endured and continue to endure high electricity prices because of the present setup of GEBE."
Further, St. Maarten is yet to receive an official response regarding the appointment of its candidate for the board of the Committee for Financial Supervision CFT. Government had proposed businessman Michel Soons earlier this year, but there has been no movement by the Kingdom Council of Ministers to appoint him, Heyliger said. "There has been no word on why they are stalling on the appointment. This again shows no transparency on their part."
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