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Countdown is on for Soualiga Team start
by The Daily Herald
Posted: Mar 31, 2006 18:09 UTC
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PHILIPSBURG, St. Maarten - It’s less than 24 hours before the originally planned start of the much-anticipated Soualiga Team and local authorities seem confident the programme will be started, although not on April 1.
Police Chief Commissioner Derrick Holiday fielded questions regarding the programme, which has been the centre of controversy for the past three weeks, during the first official “Meet the Press” conference, which is part of the police force’s new strategy to get closer to and be more transparent in the eyes of the public.
Holiday said he had been scheduled to meet with Voluntary Corps VKS Commander Major Jean Illidge to review the list of names of candidates who were to be used to form the Soualiga Team, but had been unavoidably detained.
Members of the Island Government had questioned the delay and were very critical of the effort being made by police to recruit new candidates, amidst the cry within the community for relief from the recent spate of robberies and thefts.
The initial plans to have the police recruit qualified police officers to form the team were frustrated by the local government’s agitation over what it said were a lack of information and a long delay in getting the programme running. It was finally decided by Local Chief of Police Lt. Governor Franklyn Richards to ease the situation by having VKS officers form the team.
However, Holiday said yesterday that, according to Richards’ orders, the VKS’ working relationship with the police in this capacity would remain the same as in their nightly programme that started in 2000, in which the VKSers work supervised by the police as a means of increasing police manpower.
Holiday said his office had received orders from Richards and the police would be supervising the VKS’ operation in Philipsburg as the Soualiga Team. He will discuss the issue of uniforms and other matters with Illidge when the two meet some time soon.
Holiday said he did not think it was in accordance with correct procedures for him as Chief Police Commissioner to go to the Executive Council to answer questions unless instructed to do so by his superior the Local Chief of Police. This was his response to questions concerning allegations that he had not been forthcoming with information to the Executive Council regarding the progress or lack thereof with the recruitment of candidates to form the Soualiga Team.
Holiday also said that as far as he was aware the Executive Council not only had ample information regarding the progress of the recruitment process, but had tabled the matter earlier in the year based on the information it was getting.
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