CUPECOY--Prime Minister Dr. Luc Mercelina, in an address at the Governor’s Symposium 2025 on St. Maarten’s constitutional and developmental path, challenged long-held political notions, describing St. Maarten’s current state as “an illusion of country, sustained by oversized institutions and a hypnotic fixation on independence.”
Dr. Mercelina said that for too long, St. Maarten has lived with the idea of being a “country” without accepting the practical and financial realities that come with that definition. “We continue to operate under the illusion of country,” he said. “By definition, a country is a well-defined territory with full political independence. St. Maarten is not that. We are a constituent state within the Kingdom, and our survival depends on how well we adapt to that reality.”
He emphasized that while St. Maarten has made tremendous progress since attaining country status in 2010, the island’s model of governance and institutional structure has not evolved to match its size, capacity, or economic means. “Our structures must reflect our realities,” he said. “We cannot continue to copy larger countries and expect sustainability. The institutions we have created are noble in design but heavy in cost.”
Reflecting on fifteen years of autonomy, the Prime Minister described them as years of learning and sometimes of painful discovery. “Independence and isolation will not work for St. Maarten,” he said firmly. “We cannot build our future by standing alone, as we have attempted for the past fifteen years. We must strengthen cooperation with other Caribbean nations and regional organizations such as the OECS and CARICOM. Our development cannot rely solely on historical ties to Aruba and Curaçao. We must also look to our closest neighbors, the French side, Anguilla, Saba, St. Eustatius, St. Kitts, Nevis, and Montserrat, who share our realities in health care, education, climate change, and border management.”
He said the time has come to abandon what he called “romantic beliefs” about St. Maarten’s place within the Kingdom. “The term Netherlands Antilles is gone, yet we have reintroduced it under another name,” he said. “The so-called CAS construction, Curaçao, Aruba, and St. Maarten, is wishful thinking. It keeps us looking backward instead of forward. We cannot shape our future by clinging to structures that belong to the past.”
Dr. Mercelina also addressed the financial and administrative weight of St. Maarten’s current system. He described the island’s government structure as “an expensive illusion,” pointing to the large number of advisory and oversight bodies created to mirror those of larger nations, from the Council of Advice and the General Audit Chamber to the Social Economic Council, the Constitutional Court, the Integrity Chamber, and the Council of Law Enforcement. “We have built a system that looks impressive on paper, but financially and functionally it is too heavy for our population size,” he said. “You cannot build a nation without a professional treasury, strong human resources, and a balanced budget that reflects our true capacity. We have an oversized institutional head for a very small community, and it makes good governance more difficult rather than easier.”
He argued that St. Maarten’s future lies not in separation from the Kingdom but in redefinition, a new kind of relationship that is modern, balanced, and based on equality and co-ownership. “If we want to survive as an autonomous constituent state, we must redefine the Kingdom in its entirety,” he said. “We must end the promotion of the CAS construction and instead build direct relationships between St. Maarten and the Netherlands. We must move from stakeholder to co-owner in the Kingdom, and decolonize the lines of communication that currently weaken our dialogue.”
The Prime Minister criticized what he called “a tangled web of intermediaries” between Philipsburg and The Hague, involving the Governor, the Minister Plenipotentiary, the State Secretary for Kingdom Relations, the Dutch Representation in Philipsburg, and other overlapping bodies, describing them as inefficient and outdated. “If we truly wish to strengthen the Kingdom, we must speak to each other as equals,” he said. “My dialogue partner as Prime Minister of St. Maarten should be the Prime Minister of the Netherlands, not a State Secretary.”
He added that the Kingdom’s structure should be based not on uniformity but on diversity. “Our strength lies not in similarities but in differences,” he said. “We should embrace the unique characteristics of each country in the Kingdom rather than trying to fit into a single mold. That is how true partnership is built.”
Dr. Mercelina proposed that defense, health care, and education become shared responsibilities within the Kingdom, ensuring that all constituent countries benefit from mutual support and collective expertise. He called for fiscal discipline and structural reform as the foundation of a more sustainable St. Maarten. “A balanced national budget with real capital expenditure is the only tool that can justify sustainable nation-building,” he said. “You cannot build ministries or a nation without the financial foundation to sustain them.”
He warned that as long as the country continues to function under its current illusion, it will remain dependent on external support while being trapped by the cost of its own bureaucracy. “We must stop pretending that we can afford everything we have built. We must be realistic about what is possible and focus our energy on what works.”
While the message was blunt, the Prime Minister ended on a hopeful note, highlighting the achievements of the last fifteen years. He cited progress in infrastructure, health care, and energy, noting the rebuilding of the airport and harbor, the ongoing construction of the new hospital, and the installation of containerized generators at GEBE. “We have achieved great things,” he said. “In fifteen years we have proven that we can stand, rebuild, and innovate. But if we want to continue growing, we must rethink how we define ourselves.”
Dr. Mercelina closed with a reflection that underscored his call for unity and realism. “We have inherited a history that was not always ours to choose,” he said, “but the future is ours to create. St. Maarten has always been small in size but great in spirit. It is time our structures, our alliances, and our ambitions reflect that truth.”
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