CFO Counterpart at PJIAE 3 Years Behind
SIMPSON BAY – The appointment of a counterpart to the Dutch Chief Financial Officer (CFO) at the Princess Juliana International Airport (PJIAE- operations company) remains without reason after three years since the agreement to implement the position was made.
Ben van der Klift was recently screened, appointed and presently serves as the third Dutch CFO of the airport since 2019. The installation of a Dutch representative on the management and supervisory board was part of the agreement for PJIAE to receive financing for the reconstruction of the terminal building to the tune of US $100 million by the St. Maarten Trust Fund and European Investment Bank. That package included a counterpart to the Dutch CFO. The counterpart would work alongside the CFO for two years and continue at the helm of the position. Yet to date it has not materialized. According to the Ministry of Tourism Economic Affairs and Transport, “the process was not finalized by the airport companies and was subsequently put on hold.” The statement added that it is the intention of the new CFO to restart the process in June 2022.
Purpose for Appointment
That agreement was made in 2019 by the United Democrats (UD) and St. Maarten Christian Party (SMCP) led government. The need for a CFO emerged when the former CFO Ravi Daryanani resigned to take up a position in Curacao. Until then PJIAE’s Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Brian Mingo temporarily held the position’s responsibilities. In an edition of PJIAE’s 2019 newsletter of April 29, Mingo stated, “My start was a very challenging one with our airport finding itself having to juggle its cash flow to meet its obligations head-on. Our Executive Management team is not yet completed as we are still in pursuit of a much-needed Chief Financial Officer, which did not make it easier.”
Rotating Role
The first person installed as CFO was Gerben Stavast who began working at the company on August 1, 2019 as a financial advisor and was officially appointed in January 2020. This was announced during a general all staff meeting on January 14, according to the company’s newsletter of that month. But due to reasons which remain unknown to date, Stavast resigned and returned to the Netherlands. He expressed his wish to resign in October 2019 according to a statement made by Mingo in a parliament meeting of May 12, 2020.
Following this event was the appointment of Leo Van der Meiden who served as Stavast’s replacement since March 2020 and officially installed in July 2020. Van der Meiden was replaced by the current CFO Ben van der Klift who began in November 2021 since Van der Meiden embarked on his retirement journey.
Counterpart Process Stonewalled
Despite three CFO’s being installed since 2019, the local counterpart has not been initiated. BDO, an accounting and professional service firm was contracted to conduct the recruitment for the position which was done on July 14, 2020 with a deadline of August 7, 2020. Nine persons applied for the job and the top three would be interviewed according to an answer provided to Parliament by former Minister of Finance Perry Geerlings. This was during a public meeting on August 12, 2019 on the state of affairs at PJIA. “The target date for the appointment of the CFO counterpart is in September” the former minister stated.
Almost a year later during a Parliament meeting of April 1, 2020, Mingo stated three candidates for the local counterpart were being evaluated by PJIA’s supervisory board. Nothing came about the evaluation. A year later, in May 2021, when Mingo’s wrongful dismissal went to court, PJIAH’s (holding company) lawyer, Peggy Ann Brandon stated Mingo did not inform the holding on efforts on the local counterpart. “Mingo did not consider it necessary to keep the shareholders informed of progress. Requests were not responded to, with the protection of the supervisory board which often took the position that it could lecture shareholders.” This was published in a report by The Daily Herald.
During the April 1,2022 public meeting in Parliament, Independent Member of Parliament Christopher Emmanuel asked the Minister of TEATT, Roger Lawrence, “who is in charge of the CFO’s counterpart’s selection and appointment?” The response provided was “the Managing Board of PJIAE to PJIAH for approval.” When asked about the counterpart process, chairwoman of PJIAE supervisory board, Kamla Besancon replied “as a general rule the Supervisory Board does not comment on or discuss airport matters.”
It remains unclear whether the three persons previously selected will be considered for the position in June, or will an entire new recruitment process take place. During the Council of Ministers press briefing on April 13, 2022 the Prime Minister Silveria Jacobs responded to a question on the appointment of the counterpart and stated “this has been the concern of the government of St. Maarten as well, from the moment we came in in 2019.” Jacobs added “since our start here we have been insisting that this takes place as soon as possible… this is another area in which we question the priorities of that operations company and the Minister of TEATT as our point of contact will follow up accordingly.”
