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List of Banks in Sint Maarten

 

The Island Territory of Sint Maarten (Dutch: Eilandgebied Sint Maarten) is one of five island territories (Eilandgebieden) of the Netherlands Antilles, encompassing the southern half of the island of Saint Martin. At the 2001 Netherlands Antilles census, the population of the Eilandgebied was 30,594. The official estimate of population as at 1 Jan 2009 was 50,300 for a population density of 1,965 inhabitants per km². The official languages are Dutch, English and Papiamento; a local English-based creole dialect is also spoken.

Sint Maarten borders the French overseas collectivity of Saint-Martin, which occupies the northern half of the island.

On 10 October 2010, the Netherlands Antilles will be dissolved and Sint Maarten will become an autonomous country within the Kingdom of the Netherlands.
 

 

Bank v.d. Nederlandse Antillen
Address: W.J.A. Nisbeth Road 25
Phone: (599) 542-3520
Fax: (599) 542-4307



Barclay's Bank PLC
Address: Frontstreet 29
Phone: (599) 542-3511 / (599) 542-2491 / (599) 542-2567
Fax: (599) 542-4531



Chase Manhattan Bank NA
Address: E.C. Richardson St.
Phone: (599) 542-3801 / (599) 545-4205 / (599) 545-4305
Fax: (599) 542-3692



FirstCaribbean International Bank Ltd.
Address: 38 Back Street
Phone: (599) 542-3511
Fax: (599) 542-4531



Orco Bank
Address: Union Road 139 F, Union Plaza - Cole Bay
Phone: (599) 544-4744
Fax: (599) 544-4745



RBTT Bank Sint Maarten N.V.
Address: A.C. Cannegieter St.
Phone: (599) 542-5908
Fax: (599) 542-5964


Scotiabank
Address: Backstreet 54, Phillipsburg
Phone: (599) 542-3317 / (599) 542-2262
Fax: (599) 542-2435



SFT Bank
Address: Airport Road 30A
Phone: (599) 545-2070 / (599) 545-2071
Fax: (599) 545-2073



The Windward Islands Bank Ltd.
Address: Clem Labega Square, Phillipsburg
Phone: (599) 542-2313
Fax: (599) 542-4761

 

History
See also: History of Saint Martin
In 1493, during Christopher Columbus' second voyages to the West Indies, upon first sighting the island he named it Isla de San Martín after Saint Martin of Tours because it was November 11, St. Martin Day. However, though he claimed it as a Spanish territory, Columbus never landed there, and Spain made the settlement of the island a low priority.

The French and Dutch, on the other hand, both coveted the island. While the French wanted to colonize the islands between Trinidad and Bermuda, the Dutch found San Martín a convenient halfway point between their colonies in New Amsterdam (present day New York) and Brazil. With few people inhabiting the island, the Dutch easily founded a settlement there in 1631, erecting Fort Amsterdam as protection from invaders. Jan Claeszen Van Campen became its first governor, and soon thereafter the Dutch East India Company began their salt mining operations. French and British settlements sprang up on the island as well. Taking note of these successful colonies and wanting to maintain their control of the salt trade, the Spanish now found St. Martin much more appealing. The Eighty Years' War which had been raging between Spain and the Netherlands provided further incentive to attack.

Spanish forces captured Saint Martin from the Dutch in 1633, seizing control and driving most or all of the colonists off the island. At Point Blanche, they built Old Spanish Fort to secure the territory. Although the Dutch retaliated in several attempts to win back St. Martin, they failed. Fifteen years after the Spanish conquered the island, the Eighty Years' War ended. Since they no longer needed a base in the Caribbean and St. Martin barely turned a profit, the Spanish lost their inclination to continue defending it. In 1648, they deserted the island.

With St. Martin free again, both the Dutch and the French jumped at the chance to re-establish their settlements. Dutch colonists came from St. Eustatius, while the French came from St. Kitts. After some initial conflict, both sides realized that neither would yield easily. Preferring to avoid an all-out war, they signed the Treaty of Concordia in 1648, which divided the island in two. During the treaty's negotiation, the French had a fleet of naval ships off shore, which they used as a threat to bargain more land for themselves. In spite of the treaty, relations between the two sides were not always cordial. Between 1648 and 1816, conflicts changed the border sixteen times. In the end, the French came out ahead with 21 square miles (54 km2) to the 16 square miles (41 km2) of the Dutch side.

Although the Spanish had been the first to import slaves to the island, their numbers had been few. But with the new cultivation of cotton, tobacco, and sugar, mass numbers of slaves were imported to work on the plantations. The slave population quickly grew larger than that of the land owners. Subjected to cruel treatment, slaves staged rebellions, and their overwhelming numbers made them impossible to ignore. On July 12, 1848, the French abolished slavery on their side of St. Martin. The Dutch followed suit fifteen years later.

20th century
After abolition of slavery, plantation culture declined and the island's economy suffered. In 1939, St. Martin received a major boost when it was declared a duty-free port. The Dutch side began focusing on tourism in the 1950s, with the French side following suit two decades later. Because of being split up into a Dutch and a French part, the tourist boom was heavier on Sint Maarten than on the surrounding islands. Its Princess Juliana International Airport became one of the busiest in the Eastern Caribbean. For much of this period, Sint Maarten was governed by business tycoon Claude Wathey of the Democratic Party.

The island's demographics changed dramatically during this period as well. The island's population increased from a mere 5,000 people to around 80,000 people in the mid-1990s. Immigration from the neighbouring Lesser Antilles, Curaçao, Haiti, the Dominican Republic, but also from the United States, Europe, and Asia turned the native population into a minority.

Sint Maarten became an "island territory" (eilandgebied in Dutch) of the Netherlands Antilles in 1983. Before that date Saint Martin was part of the island territory of the Windward Islands, together with Saba and Sint Eustatius. The status of an island territory entails considerable autonomy summed up in the Island Regulation of the Netherlands Antilles. The island territory of Sint Maarten was ruled by an island council, an executive council, and an administrator (Dutch: gezaghebber) appointed by the Dutch Crown.

On September 5, 1995, Hurricane Luis severely pounded the islands causing numerous damages 35 years to the day after Hurricane Donna.

In 1994, the Kingdom of the Netherlands and France signed the Franco-Dutch treaty on Saint Martin border controls, which allows for joint Franco-Dutch border controls on so-called "risk flights". After some delay, the treaty was ratified in November 2006 in the Netherlands, and subsequently entered into force on 1 August 2007. Though the treaty is now in force, its provisions are not yet implemented as the working group specified in the treaty is not yet installed.

On 10 October 2010, Sint Maarten will become a separate country within the Kingdom of the Netherlands, making it a constitutional equal partner with Aruba, Curaçao, and the Netherlands proper.

Government and politics
The Constitution of Sint Maarten was unanimously adopted by the island council of Sint Maarten on 21 July 2010. Elections for a new island council were held on 17 September 2010, since the number of seats will be increased from 11 to 15. The newly elected island council will become the Estates of Sint Maarten on 10 October.

Eugene Holiday was appointed as the first Governor of Sint Maarten (Dutch: gouverneur)—even though the current gezaghebber is often called governor in English as well—by the Council of Ministers of the Kingdom of the Netherlands in September 2010. He also will assume office on 10 October 2010.

Current composition of the island council
e • d Summary of the Sint Maarten general election results, 2010 Parties Party leader Votes % Seats
Democratic Party (DP) Sarah Wescot-Williams 2
National Alliance (NA) William Marlin 7
United People (UP) Theo Heyliger 6
Concordia Political Alliance (CPA) Jeffrey Richardson 0
Total 15

Corruption
In 1978, the government of the Netherlands Antilles installed a Research Committee on the Windward Islands (Dutch: Commissie van Onderzoek Bovenwindse Eilanden) to investigate claims of corruption in the island government. Even though the report issued by this commission was destructive for the island government, measures were not put into place to curb corruption, arguably because the government of the Netherlands Antilles depended on the support of Wathey's Democratic Party in the Estates of the Netherlands Antilles. In August 1990, the public prosecutor of the Netherlands Antilles started an investigation into the alleged ties between the island government of Sint Maarten and the Sicilian Mafia, and in 1991 the Court of Audit of the Netherlands Antilles issued a report which concluded that the island government of Sint Maarten was ailing.

In the government and parliament of the Netherlands, the call for measures became louder and louder. With Dutch pressure, the government of the Netherlands Antilles installed the Pourier Commission tasked with investigating the state of affairs of the island government of Sint Maarten in December 1991. Its report concluded that the island was in a severe financial crisis, that rules of democratic decision-making were continuously broken, and that the island government constituted an oligarchy. In short, the island government failed completely according to the report. After long negotiations, the Kingdom government enacted an Order-in-Council for the Kingdom (Dutch: Algemene Maatregel van Rijksbestuur) in early 1993, placing Sint Maarten under direct supervision by the Kingdom. Although originally meant for one year, the Order-in-Council for the Kingdom was eventually extended until 1 March 1996.

Though much has changed since, allegations of criminal activities continue to plague Sint Maarten. In 2004, the Minister of Justice of the Netherlands Antilles asked the Scientific Research and Documentation Centre (Dutch: Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek- en Documentatiecentrum (WODC)) of the Dutch Ministry of Justice to conduct research into organized crime in Sint Maarten. The report concluded that money laundering and cocaine trade are widespread on Sint Maarten. It also alleged that money from the island was used to finance terrorist networks Hamas, its associate Holy Land Foundation, and the Taliban.

In April 2009, former Commissioner Louie Laveist was convicted to an 18 month prison sentence by the Sint Maarten Court of First Instance, on accounts of forgery, fraud, and bribery. He was later acquitted for forgery and fraud by the Common Court of Justice of the Netherlands Antilles and Aruba, but not for bribery.

Geography
Settlements

Philipsburg with 1,228 inhabitants
Lower Prince's Quarter with 8,123 inhabitants
Cul de Sac with 7,880 inhabitants
Cole Bay with 6,046 inhabitants
Upper Prince's Quarter with 4,020 inhabitants
Little Bay (Fort Amsterdam) with 2,176 inhabitants
Simpson Bay with 736 inhabitants
Lowlands with 232 inhabitants
Education
American University of the Caribbean School of Medicine (AUC), founded in 1978, was previously located on Montserrat. Because of the eruption of the Soufrière Hills volcano in 1995, AUC moved its campus to St. Maarten later that year. A permanent campus was completed in 1998 in Cupecoy.
University of St. Martin (USM) in Philipsburg. USM is an affiliate of Johnson & Wales University.
Economy
Windward Islands Airways has its headquarters on the grounds of Princess Juliana Airport in Sint Maarten.

See also
Caribbean portal

CourthouseSaint Martin, the Caribbean island.
Saint Martin (France), the French neighboring side of St. Maarten.
History of St. Martin, the Caribbean island.
List of Sint Maarten governors.
Culture of St. Martin, the Caribbean island.
O sweet Saint-Martin's Land (bi-national song/anthem of Saint-Martin/Sint-Maarten)
Princess Juliana International Airport
Maho Beach -- famous viewing area for airport takeoffs and landings.

 

 

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