Massive redundancies RvC-members

January 21, 2011 6:29 AM

Sixty-five members of Boards of Commissioners (RvC) of government NV’s recently received their notice in the mailbox.

These letters were the result of a decision made by the Schotte-cabinet to dismiss all members in commissioner posts of government agencies. In this, it regards commissioners who had refused the government’s request to hand in their resignation.

The government’s decision contravenes the advice from the Institution Government Accountants Bureau (Soab), the advisor of good corporate governance. On December 1st last year, this institution advised the government against instituting massive redundancies. The government requested the Soab’s advice on the massive redundancies, based on the fact that the newly installed government wished to pursue their own policy with the government NV’s. This way, the government also wanted to guarantee their policy would go through by appointing commissioners who could be trusted by the new political administrators. However, the Soab’s advice stated massive redundancies were consistent with the current code corporate governance. The institution further concluded that an objective assessment by the government of the commissioners’ performance was not possible because the government policy lacked a further interpretation. According to the Soab, the argument of the matter of confidence will not wash because one can only speak of a lack of confidence in the sitting commissioners upon a ‘structural discord between commissioners on the one hand and the government as shareholder on the other hand’ after a thorough periodical evaluation. According to the government accountant, it is not clear whether such an evaluation had taken place.

However, the government had not agreed with the Soab’s advice and had requested a second advice from the Soab on that same day, December 1st. The government found that the advice had not considered the change of the composition of the commissioners’ posts, which aims at bringing these RvC’s into line with the code corporate governance. This request was not sufficient to bring the Soab round, whereupon the government decided not to act on the Soab’s previous advice. This is possible in conformity with the Island-Regulation corporate governance.
The commissioners who had received a notice, had sat on the boards of amongst others Curoil, Aqualectra, Refineria di Kòrsou, Bus Company Curaçao, Postal Company NPNA, Air Traffic Control Naatc, Harbor Company CPA, Curaçao Industrial and International Trade Development (Curinta), Buskabaai, Selikor, Woningbouw NV, the former government laboratory ADC and Core NV.

20 January 2011