THE HAGUE--Director of Kingdom Relations of the Dutch Ministry of Home Affairs and Kingdom Relations BZK Erwin Arkenbout (57) is taking up a new challenge per September 15 as the new Director Judicial System of the Dutch Ministry of Security and Justice V&J.

 

Arkenbout’s appointment at the V&J Ministry was announced by the General Management Service ABD of the BZK Ministry on Tuesday, at which time the stakeholders were also informed. His successor at the BZK Ministry will be announced early next week.

 

“Thankful, challenging, dynamic and pleasant” were some words that Arkenbout used to describe his work of the past five years as Director. At the same time he acknowledged that there were great problems on the islands, mainly poverty and unemployment, and in areas like healthcare, integrity, security, education and economic development.

 

  “Despite the many challenges and the occasional frictions, I think we managed to have a good, constructive cooperation with the islands. Naturally you always hope to achieve more. I look back at these years with a good feeling. I will miss these years,” he told The Daily Herald on Tuesday.

 

  “One of the most important things in the relations with the islands is to make time to keep in touch, to listen carefully and to get to know people,” said Arkenbout, who always made it a point to have an open-door policy and to talk to as many people as possible. “In this position you should not limit yourself to sitting across the Prime Minister. Whenever I had the opportunity I would go into the districts to meet people.”

 

  Arkenbout knows the Dutch Caribbean well, even before his appointment as Director Kingdom Relations on September 1, 2012. From 2002 to 2004, he worked in St. Maarten as Director of the Cabinet of Island Governor Franklyn Richards.

 

  After his return to the Netherlands from St. Maarten, Arkenbout worked at the Ministry of V&J as Head of the Sector Constitutional and Administrative Law and as Director Administrative Law at the Council of State.

 

  Arkenbout, who studied law and promoted at the Catholic University of Nijmegen, has also worked as an attorney-at-law and as a Judge in his early career. The legal and constitutional system and law in general is well-known territory. In his new function, he will head the department that supports the judicial infrastructure, the Public Prosecutor’s Offices and the Judiciary.

  

  Arkenbout emphasised that he wasn’t leaving the BZK Ministry out of disappointment or a dispute of some kind, as was rumoured, but that he found the time was right to make the next step in his career.

 

  “From the onset, I have said that one should not stay in the same place as Director for too long. Besides, it is common for Directors to switch after a number of years,” he said. A position opened up at the Ministry of V&J and Arkenbout decided to go for it. “I applied, as did a number of other candidates.”

 

  Arkenbout said the decision was “purely” his own and should not be seen in relation to the reported “exodus” at the BZK Ministry or the pending departure of Secretary-General Richard van Zwol, the highest civil servant at the Ministry to take the Council of State, and the fact that caretaker Minister of Home Affairs and Kingdom Relations Ronald Plasterk will be leaving soon.