Illegal Bonaire, Sint Eustatius and Saba (BES) Laws

Kralendijk, August 17, 2023 - Bonaire Human Rights Organization reaction to Dutch State-Secretary van Huffelen call to participate in internet-consultations

With regards to The Dutch government uses “internetconsultatie” https://www.internetconsultatie.nl/wolbesfinbes/b1 to collect ideas from residents and organizations, including Non-governmental Organizations (NGO), about legislative proposals. That these so-called consultations would be your chance to have your say on new laws before they become final.

The call for organizations to react or give input to the Law change WolBES and FinBES process, please find Bonaire Human Rights Organization reaction and objection hereunder to the intention to legitimize the illegal Bonaire, Eustatius and Saba (BES) laws:

“Unjust acts do not create law.”

The BES laws with respect to Bonaire in particular were created on an unjust unlawful base, as the democratic power and responsibility of the Bonaire people were reversed and subordinated back under The Hague overseas colonial rule on October 10, 2010.

This act, considered internationally, as an annexation and continuation of colonization by the Netherlands was declared by the international community, and United Nations (UN), as “crime against humanity”, and remains a disputable international case, as it was imposed on the people of Bonaire, without their consent, and not respecting and denying their fundamental inalienable right to self-determination.

The right of self-determination solely belongs to the people, not to the government of Bonaire, and neither the government of Holland.

The imposed BES laws violate the main fundamental human and self-determination right of the peoples and cannot be considered legal, as they were imposed by the Dutch colonial administrative power over the people. Who decides the question of democracy and self-determination? In a real democracy, the people do, and in a fake democracy, the empire does.

We cannot cooperate and continue to legitimize the unjust system and laws created and imposed against the wishes and democratic decision of the peoples, as they deny our legitimate inalienable human and self-determination rights.

This call or indecent proposal of the Holland government to involve the civil society in this illegal process of legitimizing its unlawful acts can be considered to “invite the civil society to be an accomplice in the Holland government’s continued violations of the main pillars of modern civilization based on democracy and human rights.  

In fact, inviting the civil society to cooperate with the Holland government’s violation of several of Bonaire people’s international legal instruments and the UN’ Charter, and UN’s Decolonization Declaration

Violations of articles 1, 55, 73 and 103 of the Charter of the United Nations and resolutions 742, 747, 945, 1514 and 1541 et al. that affirm the inalienable rights of the people of Bonaire to self-determination.

-          The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights

       International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights

-          International Covenant on All Forms of Racial Discrimination

-          United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples