St. Maarten Private Eye

From personal experience I have noticed the French bars and restaurants are fully complying with the new French smoking rules. Which means inside bars and restaurants smoking is forbidden and no ashtrays can be placed there. On terraces and outside it is allowed to smoke. The only problem I have noticed is with covered terraces: there is some uncertainty about it. The fact that the gendarmes are checking compliance from time to time makes the bar and restaurant owners comply.

I hope this answers your question!

But you know how it is, the local govt doesn't seem to care very much about animals, the environment or pollution and their people's health, why would they care about abused and orphaned children. This story has been going on over 5 or 6 years now, it's a disgrace and shameful that this island hasn't taken responsibility for these homes yet. Always blaming Curacao but wanting to govern themselves, er..... right.

LH

You stated "But you know how it is, the local govt doesn't seem to care very much......... etc". As I see it that is not only for foster homes. It also goes for a lot of other situations, where Central Government is supposed to take care of the matter but does not do what it needs to do for Sint Maarten, because it would go at the expense of Curacao.

We can cry "no fair" but that aint going to cut it.

It is plain and simple. We choose our representatives here, and when they see that things are neglected, be it ad hoc or not, they should do what needs to be done. The blame game does not make sense to me, meaning pointing your fingers at others for what they should have done, whereas you have it in your power to do things yourself.

At any rate, all this neglect coming from Curacao, also in connection with the situation of the judicial chain (police and prison system) is all the more reason that Sint Maarten goes its own way and takes care of its own affairs.

We shall have to grow into that!

Observer1602

you said it, LH
the sadder thing is that even most people in the community don't care.
Those poor kids!

At first glance this looks like a major screw up by immigration but hold on a minute.
Shouldn't the company " Caribbean Exotica" accept the blame rather than pushing it off on immigration?
A word of advice to Mr. Roland van Grieken : Next time concentrate on getting the correct information to your clients before you start counting your comission money.
This is not a problem caused by immigration it is a problem caused by Caribbean Exotica. Had Caribbean Exotica been on top of it's game it would have made sure His highness had all the documents in place for his entourage.
Caribbean Exotica has embarassed St. Maarten and needs to man up and accept the blame.

Lack of visa halts Prince's vacation in St. Maarten - 13th February 2008

You said it right my friend. Thank you. Van Grieken is the one to blame. Everyne blames immigration so for everything that goes wrong on the airport. So why not this one. Accept you blame and be a man

How in the world can we screw up something like not allowing the Prince of Qatar entry into St.Maarten. These people probably think we are some kind of Banana Republic. I understand they require Visas, but didn't the VIP company handling their affairs knew of these requirements. Why couldn't they arrange entry from Fr St.Martin at the initial stage.
I still can't believe such a screw up could take place in this time and age.
The letter to the editor today in Herald about firing some people should be seriously considered. This shows gross incompetence of the VIP agency, the airport and immigration. We lost a golden opportunity here. These people will never set foot on this island again.
Unbelievable, I'm still trying to figure this one out.

The Prince has a visa for the United States right? he is one of he richest people on earth. Shouldn't his people have made sure they had a visa for entering the Netherlands Antilles?
He was going to stay at the WESTIN, thats located on Dutch SXM and the law states if his country folk need a visa they need a visa, period!
I am tired of this bullshit that everytime some rich dude comes around, we have to bend over backwards and offer our little slave selves for any little penny that will be thrown our way.
If the WESTIN is angry they lost out on rooms booked, they are right, they should take that up with VIP or whoever was the Prince local trip organiser.
But to say that our officials have to make excemptions everytime for this one and that one, where will it stop?

Here we go again-another Indian employer holding his/her employee hostage, as a slave locked up in a small room with only water. She was lucky she got that much.
A litte salary of $200, which goes to her family in India. Now the only family of indians who live on Carnation rd in Sauders are the B brothers.
You can investigate that yourselves. It's not the first time we read about these stories. Last year or one and half year ago, same story in the Belair area. The gentleman got a slap on his wrist and a little fine. I heard another story from a landlord in the Point Blanch area about a another jeweler who had over ten people sleeping in one room. They were not allowed to leave their little abode at anytime other than to work long hours.

When are we going to stop this. When are our authorities goin to send a strong message to these people for these terrible violations. A little prison time should do the trick. Maybe some community service added to a conditional sentence.
The lady in question is 60 years old.

In the 80's there was a gentleman working at the labor office by the name of Moon who exposed these type of things, he was quickly reassigned.
He exposed Mr.Ashoka, who by the way was conficted of a lot of things- He's n ow living in India,becuase they didn't confiscate his indian passport.

Expose these terrible people for what thay are. I will be looking closley how the prosecutor handle this case. The major newspapers will not carry their names,because they will loose the advertising dollar, which they care more about that the human race

Granny worked illegally as maid, granted no vacation in three years - 18th February 2008