Mike Eman: "Constitutional state overcomes"
Amigoe
3/22/2006

ARUBA -This is not a victory for the AVP, Mike Eman, or Arthur Dowers, but for the constitutional state. Within our constitutional state we have the necessary room to critically surveil the functioning of the OM in the parliamentary and public debate. With this, the judge has restored the confidence in the democracy that the OM has affected, said Mike Eman in a first reaction on the verdict, indicating that AVP, Eman, and Dowers do not have to rectify their concerns about political influence in the decision-making of the PG and the OM.

My fellow party members are witnesses of how often I had to convince the party council of the AVP that one should be very precise and careful when publically questioning the work and the position of the OM, said Eman. Often he had to tell the party that the OM has a task that can damage the interest of the people, even take away the freedom, causing a suspect and his/her family a lot of pain and harm. "The society must therefore have full confidence that the OM performs his work in an objective manner." In order to do his job, the OM must have authority in the society. But this same constitutional state that we defended when we gave the OM the benefit of the doubt, also forces us to consider which position we should take when it becomes clear that the constitutional state is in danger with an OM that had become biassed! That's when we went public to express our concern about the objectivity of the OM. In our view, the OM proceeded arbitrarily." Eman pointed out the cases that were not persecuted, and comparable cases that the OM took in hand, and all this with the pretence of political preference. "We are pleased with this verdict. It gives us room to expose dangerous tendencies with reference to such an important institution in our society. We are happy that we live in the Royal Dutch Kingdom, where party-political influence is frankly kept out of the administration of justice", says Eman.