Cayman Islands’ multi-million dollar medical tourism venture is nearing completion with an official opening of the $80 million hospital scheduled for February 25, 2014 and the first patients already booked and to arrive a week later. Tremendous
The action by students of the Statia School of Medicine on Monday triggered an interesting reaction from Epic project manager Rueben Thompson on Facebook that we share here in a slightly edited version with our readers: “Oh Sweet Sint Maarten La
The 2014 budget is not there yet, but already there seems to be a need for an adjustment. The Cft projects that the 2013 budget will close with a 13 million guilders deficit, in spite of best efforts with a liabilities and vacancy-stop and other cost
On Friday, Matthijs Huizing gave up his seat in the Dutch parliament, a bit more than three years after he became a parliamentarian for the liberal VVD. The reason: the police caught Huizing while he was drunk – at least he had more alcohol in his
Curacao-based attorney Karel Frielink hit the nail on its head, when he posted the following remark on Facebook after Nelson Mandela had passed away. “It is unfortunate that many of the politicians that are now idolizing Mandela, speak about him in
St. Maarten News - Posted by admin on December 11, 2013
St. Maarten – The 2013 budget could close with a 13 million guilders ($7.25 million) deficit. This appears from a letter from financial supervisor Cft to Finance Minister Martin Hassink. Cft-chairman Prof. Dr. Age Bakker reacts with the letter t
St. Maarten News - Posted by admin on December 11, 2013
St. Maarten – The Common Court of Justice deals tomorrow with the appeal of Meyshane Kemar Johnson against his life sentence for the murder of Michael and Thelma King on September 19 of last year. Co-defendant Jeremiah Chevon Mills is appealing his
St. Maarten News - Posted by admin on December 11, 2013
St. Maarten – Only five parliamentarians attended all ten plenary meetings of parliament in the parliamentary year that ended on October 9, and not a single MP attended all 42 meetings of the Central Committee. Frans Richardson, who is about to lau
St. Maarten News - Posted by admin on December 11, 2013
St. Maarten – A group of restless and anxious students of the University of St. Eustatius School of Medicine on St. Maarten (USESOM) gathered outside the Government Administration Building on Monday to protest the delay in their school being grante
St. Maarten News - Posted by admin on December 11, 2013
St. Maarten – A property of 4.5 acres starting at the roundabout near Learning Unlimited and going down all the way to the ocean next to the Belair Hotel has been put up for sale. The price-indication for potential buyers is $7.9 million. While
The Dutch newspaper Telegraaf is at it again. Have you heard that there is some sort of scandal going on at the national intelligence service VDSM? Yes, thank you, we know that. The Telegraaf has now discovered that VDSM-chief James Richardson cam
When politicians remain silent, the intelligentsia has to step up to the plate. That is exactly what our local poet and author Lasana Sekou did with his urgent appeal on the prime ministers on both sides of the island to denounce a measure taken in t
St. Maarten News - Posted by admin on December 11, 2013
GREAT BAY/MARIGOT - Author Lasana Sekou has called on Prime Minister Sarah Wescot-Williams and COM-President Aline Hanson, to “officially and publicly condemn the Dominican Republic Constitutional Court decision of September 13, 2013 that threate
St. Maarten News - Posted by admin on December 11, 2013
St. Maarten – Attorney Remco Stomp, the Dean of the Bar Association considers “the incident with Mr. Merx an internal matter.” In a brief reaction to this newspaper, Stomp stated: “The fact that Mr. Merx seems to prefer to publicly echo hi
St. Maarten News - Posted by admin on December 11, 2013
St. Maarten – When Francio Guadeloupe takes up his post as the Dean of Academics at the University of St. Martin per January 1, 2014, the 42-year-old has an ambitious plan at the ready: “within three years I want to see at least one third or a qu
St. Maarten News - Posted by admin on December 11, 2013
St. Maarten – The tenth European Development Fund will make €4,750,000 ($6,507,500) available for infrastructural upgrades in Dutch Quarter, the cabinet of Prime Minister Sarah Wescot-Williams announced in a press statement yesterday. Wescot-W
Now that the other side of the dispute between the Dean of the Bar Association and attorney Cor Merx has more or less come to light, it puts the harsh criticism from the dean in a different perspective. First of all, it appears now that there is a
Meindert Fennema, a columnist for the Volkskrant has a pretty good idea about how not to handle corruption – or even suspicions about corruption. Not behind closed doors, Fennema argued and he did it like this: “Murk Schaafsma (1883-1955) was
St. Maarten News - Posted by admin on December 11, 2013
St. Maarten –Not all attorneys agree with the harsh letter the Dean of the Bar Association, Remco Stomp, sent to fellow-attorney Cor Merx. Shaira Bommel told this newspaper yesterday that she does not agree with the highly critical letter. Bommel a
St. Maarten News - Posted by admin on December 11, 2013
St. Maarten – Eric Vlaun has to give account for the way he managed his father’s $20 million-estate, the late Charles Thomas Vlaun, to his sister Melissa Mitev-Vlaun, the Court in First Instance ruled yesterday in summary proceedings. Vlaun does
St. Maarten News - Posted by admin on December 11, 2013
St. Maarten – One man, identified as O.D. was arrested for firearm possession last week Friday in the early morning hours during a concerted law enforcement effort whereby five houses and the offices of three companies were searched. Members of
St. Maarten News - Posted by admin on December 11, 2013
St. Maarten – “The Council for Law Enforcement said that we are on the right path. They helped us to see things clearly. We were watched, but we were glad that we were watched,” said Denise Jacobs, the head of the detective department at the po
St. Maarten News - Posted by admin on December 11, 2013
St. Maarten – Former Finance Minister Hiro Shigemoto will probably have to stand trial in the spring of next year on charges of money laundering, fraud and forgery. Shigemoto was arrested on December 16 of last year as a suspect in the Piranha-i
St. Maarten News - Posted by admin on December 11, 2013
St. Maarten – Eager to get answers on the UN convention on the rights of the child, The St. Maarten Youth Parliament held a meeting last week at Parliament. Before handing over the floor to her youth counterpart, President of Parliament Gracita Arr
St. Maarten News - Posted by admin on December 11, 2013
St. Maarten– The Collective Preventive Services (CPS), a government agency under the Ministry of Public Health, says the country remains in a dengue epidemic phase, and residents are advised to continually be active in taking measures to mitigate t
The rapid initiative by Binkie van Es to put a plan together for an eco-friendly theme park in Little Bay is a highly commendable example of citizen-participation. With no zoning plan in place, anything could happen once the property is sold and t
St. Maarten News - Posted by admin on December 11, 2013
Curacao – Law enforcement officers raided the house of former Prime Minister Gerrit Schotte early on Monday morning. At the same time, a raid took place at the headquarters of Schotte’s party MFK – Movementu Futuro Kòrsou. Speculation was runn
St. Maarten News - Posted by admin on December 11, 2013
St. Maarten – The National Intelligence Service VDSM was never involved in the Vesuvius investigation, as the Telegraaf suggested on Saturday in a story about VDSN-chief James Richardson. “That seems to me to be a tall story,” Bart den Hartigh,
St. Maarten News - Posted by admin on December 11, 2013
St. Maarten – Binkie van Es, a fervent birdwatcher and photographer, is the initiator of a plan to save Little Bay Pond and to create an eco-friendly attraction on the site that will leave the rich birdlife in the pond untouched. “We are putting
We have been following with keen attention the 2014 budget discussions and have suggested some weeks ago that the 2014 draft budget after sending it to the Parliament of St. Maarten should be placed on the government webpage. This would allow the ent
Politicians have talked St. Maarten Day after St. Maarten Day about cooperation with the French side of the island, but very little ever came of it. This has caused some politicians to avoid that particular celebration altogether: always the same spe
The situation at the Justice Ministry requires some attention from our decision makers when they tackle the 2014 budget. We learned yesterday that the justice budget would be the subject of serious cuts. In other words, less money for law enforcement
The university was last Thursday morning the stage where students from Milton Peters College and St. Dominic High School received a dose of inspiration for starting their higher education right at home, at the University of St. Martin on Pond Island.
At the end of November, Minister of Justice Dennis Richardson gave a state of affairs report to the parliament in connection with crime and the challenges faced by our law enforcement agencies. Due to budget constraints, the minister stated that th
St. Maarten News - Posted by admin on December 11, 2013
St. Maarten – Students of Milton Peters College and St. Dominic High School had an inspiring morning at the University of St. Martin yesterday that encouraged them to take the first steps into higher education at home. Students of the Hospitality a
