Video 4 Ministers Weekly Press Briefing May 21 2025 Mercelina and Brug Dutch St Maarten

Video 4 Ministers Weekly Press Briefing May 21 2025 Mercelina and Brug Dutch St Maarten

Video 4 Minister Richelin Brug Dutch St Maarten Government Weekly Minister Press Briefing Wednesday May 21 2025 Full Question and Answer session

Emil Lee of IL92 Radio: Good morning. My question is for the Minister VSA. Good morning. So I’ve asked a number of times if you’ve had the opportunity to familiarize yourself with the Saha legislation. Are you now familiar with the Saha legislation?

RICHINEL BRUG: Still busy with it. Still busy diving into it. As we speak, actually, the team is upstairs in the office waiting for me to return for us to continue diving into it.
An update that I can give you pertaining to that is that tomorrow I have been invited also to the CERB in order for me to do the second part of the financial aspect of it. That would be also presented to the CERB before they continue with their screening or their approval or their conclusion of the Saha.
Just for clarity, more specifically, have you read the full legislation yourself now?

And now I am busy with it. I haven’t completed it as yet. I’m busy with it. We’re not moving on.

We now move on to the second round.

You have the floor.

I’ll move on to, back to the Prime Minister.

I’m sorry. Prime Minister, do you know if the emergency generators, if the payments are up to date based on the agreement that were signed by the late Troy Washington,

I think yourself was involved in the agreements that were signed with the emergency generators, are the payments up to date?

And as we continue, I’d like to ask you another question.

Yesterday I think it was Sol, decided to close all gas stations because there was some confusion
with price control, the price or the increase of fuel price or whatever.

All gas stations were closed.

I personally contacted the Minister of TH, she reached out to them and then shortly after there was some press release that was issued.
What I’d like to know is that Sol being the only distributor of fuel on Saint Martin right now, actually most of the stations are Sol, she reached out to them and then shortly after there was some press release that was issued.

What I’d like to know is that Sol being the only distributor of fuel on Saint Martin right now, actually most of the stations are Sol, can somebody tell us if there’s any form of stockpiling that exceeds 30 days? Has there been anyone in government, and I know it’s not your ministry,
but as Prime Minister, this is an emergency situation.
When gas station decide to close down because of increase of prices then, yeah, is anyone there to check and to see if they had exceeded their 30 day that they had, because every 30 day they refill gas.
Has anyone checked to see if the prices matches what they’re giving?

Because TNT, which is straight out of Tobago, the gas fuel prices there is always higher.

But if you check, since December it’s been declining.
But here on Saint Martin, it’s the contrary.

So I’d like to know if you had looked into this.
Coming first to the first question about the generators, as you know we got a loan from

the Netherlands to purchase the generators.
That is already arranged, that money has been received.
There were no conditions related to the loan.
I’m going to repeat it every time again.
The only two conditions for the loan is the 25 years payback and 2.43% interest on the loan.
You will never get this condition on the international capital market. That’s one. One other condition that was presented to us is that we requested, because of a request
from GEBE to the government of St. Martin, that they wanted assistance and Actually, technical assistance to guide the process of ordering the generators, guiding
the process of transportation of the generators, and actually guiding the whole process of actually accommodating the three huge generators, each of nine megawatts, being together 27 megawatts.

For that to happen, you have to realize that you have to actually… http://www.sxmnews.ai
Reorganize your whole energy plant to accommodate these three huge generators.
And actually, you have to combine it also with your future vision that you have, how you are going to organize your whole energy plant.

So it’s not just organizing to purchase the generator and just pack them up in the back
garden of GEBE, no.
It’s a whole concept organization to see how this has to work.
And because of that, we are busy.
There is a… I have an energy committee that is guiding the process of the loan part to GEBE.

They are busy also with GEBE already, negotiating the terms of references.
For example, how are we going to order?
Where are we going to order the generators?
That is all. It has to go in bidding, of course.
Just like that, just go to one supplier.
You have to… You have to adhere to your responsibility and your transparency in choices, too. And further, you have to make sure that it’s well organized. And for that also, they are also informed with GEBE to actually recruit a technical assistant as the one actually responsible for that purchase project. These three generators. Once that process is done, the generators are going to be purchased and they’re going

Realize, I said it always, the moment you order the generators until they are at place and functional, it’s going to take one and a half to two years.
And before, because I realize that, I’m actually constantly in contact with that energy committee
and GEBE for them to actually keep…
The cadence in it for us to be able to order these generators as soon as possible, but
it’s a very complex…
It’s about the financing.

It’s about the deal between government and GEBE. https://stmaartennews.ai/important-notice-financial-aid-st-maarten-recipients-issued-accessing-funds/

It’s about purchasing of the generators.

It’s about accommodating the technical assistant.
And there’s more going on is, of course, we are busy now at this particular moment accommodating the sea suit level of GEBE.
There is a lot of things parallel going on.
And of course, we have to focus for GEBE to parallel with this, focusing on renewable green energy for the future of St. Martin.
And I realize what I have done since I’m in government, we had a energy crisis with instability of supply of energy.
I have been able to stabilize the grid.
There is still a challenge outside there.
It’s not to have a stable grid that we have now, but stability can continue if you have sustainability of your grid now.
And what we have to work on now is sustainability for the nearby future, for guarantee of constant energy supply for the people of St. Martin.
And that’s why I’m constantly in contact with the energy committee and also with GEBE, knowing
that I did my part.
That’s what you wanted from me, that is the technical assistance conditions we got almost …