Herzieningswet Wet openbare lichamen Bonaire, Sint Eustatius en Saba en Wet financiën openbare lichamen Bonaire, Sint Eustatius en Saba

Reactie

Vraag1

How can a government that proclaims, “Good Governance” and claims to be “Civilize” makes agreements but depending on the opinions of “The One” occupying a position, makes unilateral changes to laws. Claiming to “Hear” us through a cleverly composed process, but not “Listening”. Reminds me of a Caribbean proverb “who don’t hear will feel”. There is this book that was published in 1945 by George Orwell, “Animal Farm” where commandments were created but eventually change to “all animals are equal, some are more equal than others”.
There was a work conference held in De Bilt, Utrecht, from the 4th to the 6th of March 2024, with a number of key stakeholders that resulted in an agreement list. (D056033 - Afspraken werkconferentie WolBES/FinBES (https://open.overheid.nl/documenten/51abf707-bd98-4bcf-8b28-a937adfa85ea/file)
Do agreements matter?
It gave the impression that, “he who pays has the say”. On the 9th of June 2022, a letter was sent to the 1st chamber regarding “Allocation of income and expenditure to the Caribbean Netherlands” (Ref. number 2022-0000100017), sighed by state secretaries of “Finance – Taxation and Tax Office”, and Interior Kingdom Relations, Digitalization and Kingdom Relations.
It proclaims that in 2019 the Central Government received about €162 million in income from the Caribbean Netherlands and incurred about €444 million in expenditure for the welfare of the inhabitants. Of the Caribbean Netherlands. This means that 49.6%, 19.9% and 11.6% respectively of the central government's expenditure on Bonaire, Sint Eustatius and Saba is covered by the income from these islands.
If one would read the letter taking the footnotes into account you would realize that a number of taxes that where collected where not included as mentioned in Belastingwet BES, namely: Inkomstenbelasting, Loonbelasting, Vastgoedbelasting, Opbrengstbelasting, Algemene Bestedingsbelasting, Overdrachtsbelasting, Kansspelbelasting.
The changes in the Fin-BES includes many extra controlling elements relating to financial reporting and access to information. Is it proper for a government to use government resources to collect income but not properly report what was collected?
Regards,
Island Council Member, St. Eustatius
Derrick Simmons