A huge step was realized on the road to the re-listing on the UN list of Non-Self Governing Territories (UN NSGT) last week with the historic admission by Dutch experts that the Netherlands violate the UN Charter and Article 73 – Bonaire a step closer to being listed back on UN NSGT
In a press release about their report, three main Dutch constitutional legal experts Prof. dr. Gert Oostindie, Prof. Gerhard Hoogers, and dr. Wouter Veenendaal admitted and confirmed that Bonaire and former Netherlands Antilles' decolonization was never confirmed by the United Nations. And furthermore that Bonaire and the other former Netherlands Antilles islands were unjustly removed from the UN list when Holland gave its own interpretation of the United Nations Charter Article 73. The Netherlands were incorrectly absolved from its reporting obligations and compliance with article 73 when they implemented the Statute in 1955.
The Dutch government had instructed the constitutional and legal experts to investigate the continuous allegations and protests of especially Mr. James Finies and NKBB (Nos Ke Bonieru Bek) against the Dutch for violations of the UN Charter on self-determination and human rights and international law since the illegal annexation of 10-10-10.
Today marks 6 years anniversary when Mr. James Finies as the first Antillean June 22, 2016, made a historic presentation at the United Nations Committee on Decolonization C24 in New York denouncing Holland's atrocities committed to Bonaire peoples in violations of the UN Charter, article 73, international law, self-determination, and human rights. Shocked by this revelation, as they never heard anything negative of Holland before, all present mission delegates and ambassadors encouraged us to have Bonaire relisted so they can help us. They plotted out a plan and road for us to get Bonaire back on the NSGT list, so the C24 officially can help, support, and assist the people of Bonaire together with Holland to comply with the article 73 and restore the rights of the people of Bonaire back.
The allegations and objections by NKBB and Bonaire Human Rights Organization of the past 12 years were proven to be correct by these Dutch legal experts. We would like to congratulate the people of Bonaire and ourselves on this historic victory and celebrate the faith to believe in our trajectory to be re-listed as NSGT. All Bonerians should be proud and honor this moment when civil society has won part of the battle with the cruelest colonizer in history.
The conclusion of these Dutch experts confirms and validates the struggle and trajectory of the NKBB and Bonaire Human Rights Organization that walked a long road with determination and consistency exposing the Bonaire colonial situation and raising awareness towards our re-listing; just like New Caledonia in 1986 and French Polynesia in 2013 were returned on the UN list of NSGT.
NKBB and Bonaire Human Rights Organization who are presently in Central America raising awareness for the cause of Bonaire mark their 125 Days fighting for these fundamental rights of the people of Bonaire. A big “Thank You!” to everyone, and especially the ones who kept believing in us and supported us through donations towards the self-governance assessment investigation and the SOS Bonaire Lives Matter UN relisting trajectory.
