Today Newspaper St. Maarten

Today’s Editorial: Fair warning

The long lines at the St. Maarten Census Office where motorists are queuing these days for their new number plates proved to be a hotbed for political discussion last week.
Surprisingly, the topic of heated debate was the 3 million dollar land scandal that cost former Public Health Minister Maria Buncamper-Molanus her job.
The anger about the self-enrichment scheme flowed freely through the corridors of the building – and everybody took part. It is amazing that, almost nine weeks after the Minister made her position available, people are still so angry about what she did.
But that’s not all. One of the participants in the debate told anyone who wanted to hear that the government better pay attention. The message was something like, if they don’t clean up their act within three months, there will be action. The statement was followed by a reference to the political unrest in North Africa.
When she made her farewell speech in parliament in December, Buncamper-Molanus said that politics in St. Maarten would never be the same again.
The rumblings among the motorists at the Census Office seem to confirm that notion.
While we do not think for a moment that an African-style revolution is almost upon us, we’d take those rumblings as a fair warning.