A two-year paid holiday awaits the losers of last week's elections!
In the general euphoria following the house cleaning the last elections brought in Parliament as well as in government, one factor is overlooked: the high cost associated with making so many office holders redundant all at once. At least four ministers and about six or seven Parliamentarians have been sent home. They have not left the government payroll however. Parliamentarians, clever fellows that they are, have made sure to provide a generous golden handshake for themselves. In all fairness it should be mentioned here that this is an old law brought over from the former Netherlands Antilles, which was in turn copied from Holland. Aruba and Curacao, as well as the BES islands, all have variants of this same law. Seems that politicians everywhere are equal opportunity moochers after all.
Articles two through ten of this law explain in detail how this golden handshake works. For up to two years after leaving office, ex pols can collect for the first three months 95 percent of their salary, the following seven months 85 percent, thereafter 75 percent for ten months, and 70 percent for the final four months. This allowance ends at the age of sixty, when the regular-generous- pension arrangement kicks in. Income earned during this period is deducted from the allowance, so that if the politician accepts another job, the allowance is reduced by the salary earned. So even in defeat, politicians manage to extract victory. They might have lost at the polls, but they still come up winners at the payroll. The rest of us should be so lucky, but then again, which other group of workers have the right to make their own pension rules? In essence, the voters will have to finance a two- year paid holiday for cast-off politicians.
Author's Name Withheld Upon Request
