SINT MAARTEN (GREAT BAY) - President Sarah Wescot-Williams opened the Parliamentary Year with a bold theme and an honest admission. Fifteen members, seventeen committees, seven factions — and a secretariat running on short staff.
Here is what the annual report says about how Sint Maarten's Parliament is structured, who sits in it, and what it set out to do.
The Parliament of Sint Maarten entered its 2025–2026 Parliamentary Year with an ambitious declaration. Under the theme "Building Digital Trust: Exploring a National AI Strategy and Further Development of an Open Parliament," the institution committed itself to a year of technological modernization, regional engagement, and renewed public accountability.
What the annual report also reveals, between the lines of the official foreword and the dry organizational charts, is a body under strain — stretched by staff shortages, recurring public crises, and the weight of a growing international agenda.
For Soualiga Newsday readers, understanding how Parliament is structured — who sits in it, what powers it holds, and how it divides its work — is essential context for making sense of everything that follows. The 2025–2026 Annual Report's opening sections lay out that architecture in detail.
The Foreword: Ambition Meets Reality
Parliament President Sarah A. Wescot-Williams, MSc., authored the foreword to the annual report, and it is worth reading carefully. She opens with the year's theme — digital trust and AI — and describes the establishment of an AI and Digital Transformation Workgroup as "a concrete step" toward a "more transparent and technologically capable institution." She frames 2025–2026 as a year of groundwork-laying, not delivery.
"Bringing Parliament closer to the people remains a key objective, and this continued digital transformation will be central to achieving it."— President Sarah A. Wescot-Williams, Foreword, Parliament Annual Report 2025–2026
Regionally, the President notes a year of active engagement. Parliament continued its cooperation through the SSS Islands Cooperative, renewed ties with Anguilla, deepened its role in Parlatino — including securing a Vice Chairmanship of a Parlatino Committee — and achieved a significant milestone: accession to ParlAmericas as an Associate Member. Within the Kingdom, Parliament pressed ahead with the Expert Group on the Democratic Deficit and took a public stand on a matter of deep historical significance.
On the international stage, the foreword highlights one of the year's most notable moments: Sint Maarten spearheaded — and fully supported — a joint resolution by Sint Maarten, Aruba, and Curaçao expressing disappointment at the Kingdom of the Netherlands' abstention on a United Nations resolution that recognized the trafficking of enslaved Africans and slavery as the gravest crime against humanity.
The three Caribbean countries were not consulted before the abstention. Their joint resolution, submitted directly to the Dutch Parliament, demanded a written response.
Domestically, the foreword acknowledges that Parliament "followed closely several matters of pressing public concern": GEBE, the legal position of firefighters and ambulance workers, banking and financial legislation, road safety, the new prison construction, and crime.
These were not peripheral topics — the meeting records show they consumed much of the parliamentary year.
The foreword closes with an honest acknowledgment that is unusual in official government documents. President Wescot-Williams writes that staff shortages — caused by "turnover, retirement, and maternity leave" — placed the Secretariat under "considerable strain." She thanks every staff member for "quite simply, keeping it together." It is a candid note of institutional vulnerability rarely seen in a parliamentary annual report.
The Architecture: 15 Members, 17 Committees, Seven Factions
The Parliament of Sint Maarten is the country's highest legislative body. Under Article 44 of the Constitution, it represents the entire population. Its fifteen members are elected for four-year terms.
The parliamentary year begins, under Article 46 of the Constitution, with a solemn public session on the second Tuesday of September — the occasion when the Governor delivers the annual policy address.
Parliament's powers are broad and constitutionally grounded. Members serve as co-legislators, hold the right of initiative (to propose legislation), the right of amendment, the right to ask questions of ministers, the right of interpellation, and the right of inquiry.
Parliament also approves and amends the national budget — one of its most consequential tools for holding the executive branch accountable.
Overseeing the body is the Presidium — the President and two Vice Presidents, who together manage meetings, enforce the Rules of Order, and represent Parliament externally.
Parliament's Constitutional Powers
- Co-legislator (Article 82)
- Right of initiative — propose legislation (Article 85)
- Right of amendment (Article 86)
- Exercise control over Government's policies
- Right to ask questions of Ministers (Article 62)
- Right of interpellation (Article 63)
- Right of inquiry (Article 64)
- Right to approve and amend the national budget (Article 100)
Seventeen Committees: Where the Real Work Happens
The daily legislative work of Parliament does not happen on the floor of the Legislative Hall — it happens in committee rooms. Under Article 21 of the Rules of Order, Parliament maintains both permanent and ad hoc committees for the investigation of specific subjects.
Any member may attend any committee meeting, but voting rights belong only to the committee's appointed members.
For the 2025–2026 Parliamentary Year, Parliament operated seventeen committees — fifteen permanent committees and two ad hoc committees.
Public Housing, Spatial Planning, Environment & Infrastructure
Education, Culture, Youth & Sports Affairs
Justice
Public Health, Social Development & Labor
Finance
Kingdom Affairs & Interparliamentary Relations
Tourism, Economic Affairs, Transport & Telecommunication
Petitions
Country's Expenditures
General Affairs
Parlatino Matters
District Councils
Constitutional Affairs & Decolonization
Agriculture, Fisheries & Animal Husbandry
Ad Hoc: New Parliament Building
Ad Hoc: Integrity
Ad Hoc: Electoral Reform
The breadth of this committee structure reflects Parliament's scope of oversight. From cemetery management (Public Housing) to cannabis regulation discussions (Agriculture), from prison conditions (Justice) to artificial intelligence briefings (General Affairs) — the 2025–2026 record shows all seventeen committees were active during the year.
A Change at the Top: A New Vice President
One of the first acts of the 2025–2026 parliamentary year was a change in leadership. On September 9, 2025 — the opening day of the parliamentary year — the Hon. Sjamira D.M. Roseburg resigned as First Vice President of Parliament. Six days later, on September 15, 2025, Parliament elected the Hon. Christopher L. Wever of the URSM faction as the new First Vice President.
The Presidium for the 2025–2026 year therefore comprised: President Sarah A. Wescot-Williams (DP), First Vice President Christopher L. Wever (URSM), and Second Vice President Ludmila N.L. de Weever (PFP). It is worth noting that the Presidium draws from three different political factions — a structural feature that lends the body a degree of cross-party balance at its helm.
The Support Structure: Twelve Staff, Under Pressure
Behind the fifteen elected members sits a secretariat of twelve staff, headed by Secretary General Garrick J. Richardson, LL.M., ML. The secretariat's core responsibilities include administrative support, procedural and legal advice, and the preparation of all parliamentary meetings.
Public meetings are broadcast live on 98.1 Pearl Radio FM, SXM.gov FM 107.9, via the Parliament's website (sxmparliament.org), and on Parliament's YouTube channel.
In addition to the twelve secretariat staff, fourteen faction staff are employed across the seven party factions — supporting the day-to-day research, communication, and constituency work of individual MPs.
By the President's own account in the foreword, that combined team of twenty-six people carried a heavy load in 2025–2026, and did not do so at full strength. The annual report's candor on this point is notable — and it raises a legitimate public question about whether Parliament's human resources are adequate for the demands placed on the institution.
