Today, more than 2000 residents of St. Eustatius can vote for their own island council. It is the starting point for the restoration of democracy. The Netherlands intervened 2018 because the administration of St. Eustatius at that time had turned away from the existing legal and state order and was no longer prepared to let go of its appropriated autonomy.
Today’s elections are part of a four-phase plan previously drawn up by State Secretary Raymond Knops. After today, the elected island council may not elect an executive council or an island governor, say a council of mayor and aldermen. Nor may it propose budget changes. Government Commissioner Marnix van Rij continues to wield the scepter and retains the right of veto on everything that the Island Council decides in the coming months.
Three parties
Three parties take part in the elections: Democratic Party (DP), Progressive Labor Party (PLP) and United People’s Coalition (UPC) with a total of 26 candidates. They are the same parties with almost the same persons as when the Netherlands intervened. DP and PLP are expected to split the five seats at stake.
Clyde van Putten, seen by many as the instigator of the administrative disorder for 2018, is on the list of the PLP as a list pusher. Almost everyone, except for his own party members, thinks that the politician will return to the island council with preferential votes.
The Democratic Party is its great rival. After the Dutch intervention, this party has always adapted to the new role under Hague authority. Although not happy with the four-step plan, the party does accept the phased return to democracy. Number two on the list, former Island Council member and Commissioner Koos Sneek, denounces the current situation in which “there is no administrative transparency and nobody knows what is happening and why”.
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