WILLEMSTAD — The new minister of Justice, Nelson Navarro (Pais), promises a rigorous approach of the crime wave currently ravaging the island. According to him, it’s unacceptable that Curaçao is confronted with violent attacks every day.

 

Navarro has a distinct message for criminals, attackers and ‘abusadornan’ (persons abusing others) on the island: “Fasten your seatbelts.” The minister made these remarks following the question round with the discussion of the draft budget 2013 of the country Curaçao in the Central Committee of the Parliament. He specifically responded to a suggestion from former minister of Justice/current PS-parliamentarian Elmer ‘Kadè’ Wilsoe, who urged Navarro to focus more on prevention in combating crime on the island. Navarro emphasized he agreed with Wilsoe’s suggestion, stating ‘otherwise we’ll just be banging our head against a brick wall’.

 

Navarro said prevention is important and described it as ‘the soft side of combating crime’. According to him, this is also a task for the Ministries of Education, Science, Culture and Sports (OWCS) and Social Development, Labor and Welfare (Soaw), but that his ministry worked on prevention in the past and will continue to do so in the future. Navarro concluded the current situation on Curaçao is unacceptable. “We must also take repressive action. Attacks occur every day. The people are being terrorized. They no longer dare to sit in the garden or on the porch even though the latter are barred. This is an impossible situation.”

 

Navarro announced to introduce rigorous measures to combat crime and will soon get around the table with the police top. These measures needn’t cost a lot of money, said the minister. Although Navarro indicated to elaborate on this within short, he meanwhile announced the daily violent attacks on the island must stop.

 

During the budgetary discussion there were also questions on the financing of the budget of Justice for the year 2013. Several parliamentarians, including MAN-member Charles Cooper, pointed out that the budget funds for education had decreased, while those for Justice had increased. It regards ten million guilders compared to the budget for 2012, according to Cooper. He urged the Hodge-cabinet not to make the same mistake as the PAR/MAN cabinets in the nineties. These cabinets had focused on financial measures while investments in the economy and social development of the island weren’t given sufficient attention, said Cooper. During the question round Navarro stated that the extra 10 million guilders for Justice doesn’t mean the ministry will get an additional 10 million guilders. Even though the budget figures were too low in the previous years, the amounts were spent. This has now been corrected in the budget of this year.