Everything must be ready by March 26, 2010

January 13, 2009 4:46 AM

Fourteen more months, and the Antilles will cease to exist, giving the Islands their new status. “Everything must be ready by March 26, 2010”, said Prime Minister Emily de Jongh-Elhage during the first press conference of this year yesterday.

The term ‘everything’ is not taken literally. “We cannot  round off the process of political change completely”, said the prime-minister again yesterday. For her part, that doesn’t necessarily have to stand in the way of the new status for Curaçao and St. Maarten as autonomous countries. She made a comparison with Aruba which left the Antillean polity 22 years ago and is still rounding off some matters.  “Many laws are not ready yet, but we can still dismantle.”  Two committees, one here and one in the Netherlands are working on a formula for this.

Another political steering committee has been planned for the second half of February, during which the prime minister wants to discuss the matter of elections some more. The current government is doing everything possible to not hold new parliamentary elections.  “The central government will step down when the four years are over”, declared the prime minister. The prime minister remains pleased with the achieved results in the negotiations with the Netherlands.  “We have been working on this for three years. You can never get the full 100 percent.”

(Source: National newspaper Amigoe)

8 January, 2009