PHILIPSBURG:--- Prime Minister of St. Maarten Sarah Wescot Williams told reporters on Wednesday that the electoral law that is now being applied on St. Maarten was passed unanimously by the former Island Council prior to St. Maarten becoming a country on October 10th, 2010. Wescot Williams said quiet some changes were made to the law compared to the one politicians are accustomed to. "The part that allowed political parties access to the voters registry was deleted from the law." First and foremost, political parties including herself as the Minister in charge of General Affairs is not allowed to have the voters registry, secondly the time frame for workers to get time off from their employers has been reduced from 4 hours to 2 hours while the opening of the polling stations has been extended by one hour. This law she said was approved by the National Alliance/Heyliger Executive Council and it was ratified by the Island Council. She said that the Parliament of St. Maarten was fully aware that the new law would have been applied in the 2014 Parliamentary Elections yet they did nothing while in Parliament to amend the law, instead they chose the accuse her as Prime Minister for changing the law.
Wescot Williams also explained that the United Peoples Party took her and the Government to court on Tuesday to obtain the voters registry which the court deemed admissible simply because the UP Party took her and the government to court instead of taking the country to court. Another case she said was filed by the UPP which will be held on Wednesday at 1:30pm.
Wescot Williams said that in the first injunction filed the by the UP Party they asked the judge to condemn government and her to pay Naf.1 million for every three hours after the verdict that they do not get the voters registry. Wescot Williams said the judge threw out the case and did not even go into the case because the UP Party took the wrong people to court (Government and Prime Minister). The judge made clear to the UP Party that the way they presented their case he deemed it inadmissible.
Wescot Williams ended her statements by saying that every carnival comes to an end and at the end of our carnival the "momo" is burnt to signify the end.
