Was an Election Deal Made with SBL for Building Permit?
PHILIPSBURG:--- Member of Parliament Maurice Lake who is also the caretaker Minister of VROMI will have a lot of explaining to do as to why he signed a building permit that bears the number 176/14 that was signed off on October 20th, 2014.
The building permit granted to SBL Management Company N.V. owned by Miti Katz allows the company to construct seven apartment buildings with a combination of 63 units, located at Welgelegen Road #68 Belair, Little Bay.
Based on documentation SMN News received, SBL submitted their request on August 18th, 2014 which is just prior to the August 29th Parliamentary Elections. However, the Ministry of VROMI booked the request in the system on September 8th, 2014 to avoid showing corruption and nepotism. The entire granting of the building permit looks shady since the letter submitted to the department of permits is dated August 18th 2014, the stamp on the letter has October 20th 2014, the same day the building permit was signed off by caretaker Minister Maurice Lake.
The question that now remains is if this Minister of "Back to Basics" made a deal or if his political party made a deal with SBL "Miti Katz" during the 2014 Parliamentary Elections. SBL (Simpson Bay Lagoon Company N.V.) is the one that developed the Simpson Bay Yatch Club.
The Parliament of St. Maarten passed a motion on August 31st, 2014 stating that the current caretaker government should not pass or sign off on any new requests seeing that some of the decisions taken might hinder the incoming government. It behooves the caretaker Minister who is also a Member of Parliament to blantantly disregard the orders of the highest legislative body of the country.
The moment SBL obtained the building permit they blocked access to the Belair Beach with a huge iron gate, besides blocking access to the beach stakeholders such as Belair Hotel, the St. Maarten Pride Foundation and Learning Unlimited School that are situated nearby were not given a chance to review the plans that SBL has for the area especially knowing that the plot of land which measures 4,274.96 square meters also includes the Belair Pond "Little Bay Pond" which is supposed to be designated a green area. In a newspaper article the Minister of VROMI went around in circles saying he does not know the developer, yet he met with the developer and further stated that he does not even remember signing off the building permit for SBL.
To show that the current MP/Minister is not telling the full truth SMN News has decided to publish the building permit that was signed off on October 20th, 2014 along with the letter that presumably was submitted on August 18th, 2014 and stamped by the department on October 20th, 2014.
Click here to view building permit granted to SBL.
