Unbiased look at the Sint Maarten Elections
It seems the Gumbs cabinet has become embroiled in separate disputes (see Friday paper) with the boards of two public-sector entities on decisions regarding their directors.
At utilities provider GEBE Romelio Maduro was suspended, placed on non-active duty and said not to be legally appointed in any function, despite the fact that Prime Minister Marcel Gumbs on behalf of the shareholder had informed the Supervisory Board recently that he couldn’t honour their request not to extend Maduro’s contract and in fact had decided to extend such for another two years pending an investigation.
At National Institute for Professional Advancement (NIPA) Education Minister Rita Bourne-Gumbs advised the board to reverse its earlier dismissal of director Vernon Richards for organising, allegedly without proper authorisation, an Open Day that the minister also attended.
The two cases are different in that GEBE is a state-owned company and NIPA a Government-subsidised foundation, but the similarity lies in the fact that their boards have a certain degree of statutory autonomy compared to, for example, Government departments. This raises the issue to what extent these latest “instructions†must actually be followed by the board members in question.
At GEBE there now appears to be a standoff, while the NIPA board was yet to react to the letter from the minister. Any decision other than complying with her wish is likely to create stalemate there as well.
In this day and age of corporate governance, administrators in the executive branch must tread with care when dealing with these types of organisations that were placed “at arm’s length†from politics for a reason. The Corporate Governance Council (CGC) was established precisely to help cover this “grey area†and the sooner the people learn of its involvement in the current developments, the better.
