WILLEMSTAD - On Friday, December 17, 2021, the Kingdom Council of Ministers (RMR) considered Curaçao's request to deviate from the financial standards for the budget pursuant to Article 25 of the Kingdom Act Financial Supervision (RFT). In accordance with this Kingdom Act, countries may only have a budget deficit with the approval of the RMR. As is known, the 2022 budget has been approved by the Parliament of Curaçao with a deficit, but it should be noted that Curaçao does not need financial support this time.
Curaçao had to meet various conditions, such as:
Adjustment of the “National ordinance first tranche optimization of government-affiliated entities” to the conditions of the RMR;
Drawing up an action plan for minimizing the losses of CMC (hospital);
Have a good score in the implementation report of the National Package in the fourth quarter of 2021;
Implementation and approval of the implementation agenda (National Package) for the first quarter of 2022;
Active participation in the realization of COHO (Caribbean Organ for Reform and Development).
Curaçao met all the conditions. Nevertheless, as has happened more often lately, the Undersecretary for the Interior and Kingdom Relations came at the last minute (last week) with extra conditions - including the political agreement on the Memorandum of Amendment (NvW) of the COHO - before the start of the RMR meeting. In addition, there was also the condition to agree to a component in the NvW during this meeting without the parliaments being able to consider it.
This was not possible because there was no coordination at the political level between the countries and the Undersecretary for the Interior and Kingdom Relations. Parliaments had also not had the opportunity to consider it.
For these reasons, the RMR has postponed the decision until the next meeting on January 21, 2022, in order to give the governments of the different countries time to properly approve the NvW. The government of Curaçao regrets the action of the Undersecretary of the Interior and Kingdom Relations.
The government will continue to inform the population about the implementation of the National Package and political developments in the Netherlands.