PHILIPSBURG:--- The collecting of concession fees for a number of years in advance from government owned companies to assist government with its current financial predicament will ruin the country's budget in the future. At least three years ahead of this year the budget of St. Maarten will have a shortfall of five million guilders.
SMN News reported last week that the government of St. Maarten approached the GEBE and asked them to take out a loan for them due to severe financial problems but GEBE refused to take a loan on behalf of government because they already have loans of their own. Instead, GEBE decided they will assist the Government of St. Maarten by paying them Naf. 15 million in concession fees for three years in advance. This proposal was accepted last week and it is further understood that government intends to approach the other government owned companies such as the Harbor Group of Companies who also pays Naf. 5 million per year in concession fees while TELEM Group of Companies was off the hook because they were operating at a loss. A source close to the Finance Department said that TELEM is supposed to starting paying its share now that the company rebounded from its financial woes and is making monies.
During the NA/DP/I-3 coalition, talks were to begin for the Princess Juliana International Airport (PJIAE) to start paying its shares to government since they have not been paying any concession fees or dividends over a period of years.
An accountant and someone that deals with budgets for several countries told SMN News that the mere fact that GEBE paid its concession fees in advance for a period of three years to this government means that the budgets for the next three years will have a shortfall of five million guilders per year. This will show up in the multi-annual report and the budget of each year. The professional that deals with budgets and figures said that this is not a good way to get out of a financial crisis because it can be considered a quick fix for now that will hamper the budgets down the line.
The professional said that whichever political party wins the election next year will have to deal with the decisions taken by the SWW-3 cabinet to collect concession fees in advance.
Another scenario given to SMN News is the amount of monies government is spending to pay salaries and other bills that they must pay monthly and the question is how far will this extra money take them. Having the COLA payments at a standstill and Ministers from the past and present collecting their salaries every month also punches a huge hole in the budgets through government expenditures.
Just recently SMN News learnt the that Parliament of St. Maarten will be spending some $20,000 for the reopening of parliament scheduled for September 10th, 2013. "This is indeed a waste of money and as a citizen I need to know why would government spend this kind of money for the opening of Parliament when it's not the beginning of a new governing period neither is it the first time the Parliament of St. Maarten is being opened. For two hours we are paying $20,000.00, $13,000.00 will be spent on decorations while the other $7,000.00 on food."