PHILIPSBURG:--- On Monday April 11th and Tuesday April 12th a conference was held at the Divi Little bay Hotel in connection the realization of the Plans of Approach for 2016. The conference was opened at 09.00 a.m. by the Honorable Minister of Justice Edson Kirindongo who welcomed the delegations from The Netherlands, Curacao and Sint Maarten.
The minister then followed by stating that: “This conference is being held due to the fact that in the month of October of this year the general order of Council regarding the execution of the Plans of Approach for the Police Force of Sint Maarten and the House of Detention will come to an end and that there must be a way for these two entities to maintain all that they have achieved thus far. In addition, the further strengthening of these entities should be worked on and also that this process be evaluated properly.
In other words we have to ensure that;
• the Plans of Approach are successfully finalized.
• the goals set in the Plans of Approach are achieved within the financial possibilities and that the milestone that have been achieved along those that are to be achieved be guaranteed.
The further building and strengthening of the KPSM and House of Detention to become better adequate organizations which can totally fill their roll in the safety and security of Sint Maarten has the fullest attention of country Sint Maarten.
The core question of this conference regarding the Plans of Approach is:
“What can there be done to jointly achieve the outstanding aspects of the Plans of Approach and how do we move on after October 2016?”
The conference ended positively with conclusion that both the House of Detention and the Korps Politie Sint Maarten will make a draft of their “Plans of Approach” which will be presented to the Minister of Justice and the Minister of General Affair who are responsible for the plans. After this documents have been discussed in the Council of Minister they will then be discussed in Second Chamber in the Netherlands on how to further process with the “Plans of Approach”.
The entities that were represented at this conference are namely: Representatives of the Netherlands in Philipsburg, members of the Progress Committee for the Plans of Approach for Sint Maarten, members of the Council for Law Enforcement, representatives of the Ministry Interior Affairs, representatives of the Ministry for Safety and Justice in the Netherlands, representatives for the Ministry of General Affairs, Finance and Justice on Sint Maarten. Representatives for the Police Force of Sint Maarten, House of Detention, Royal Dutch Marechaussee and the RST (Detective Collaboration Team).