November 30, 1998

Suriname's participation at the UNESCO conference where the thema was "The Americas project on Education for Human Rights and Culture and Peace in Panama," has earned them a gift of US$30.000 from this International Institute. The gift was granted by Professor Fedrerico Mayor, Director of the UNESCO. This money is to be used for projects relating to this thema. Mevr Patrica 'D Leon has accepted the cheque for Suriname and has already passed it on to President Jules Wijdenbosch who has promised that it will be used to support the Suriname Society on grounds of the above thema.

BAUXITE COMPANIES ALSO STOP INCOME TAX TRANSFERS

Both Bauxite companies Billiton and Suralco have decided not to pay further taxes until the State has deposited the sum of Sf10 Billion on the accounts of the companies. This amount is the alledged losses the companies have suffered because of the unrealistic X-Change rate that has to be used for the production sector. Billiton's Director Toon Blokland explained that the problem with the X-Change rate has been discussed many time over the past 14 months with members of the Ministry of Finance, the Central Bank and the Ministry of Natural Resources. Reports show that the Bauxite companies have done their best to prove that by sticking to the unrealstic rate would mean heavy losses for the companies. Blokland accused the government of keeping the companies dangling on a string by continuously asking them to have patience over the past 14 months. In a radio interview with the President of the Central Bank over this matter, Henk Goedschalk has explained that work is being done to bring about a stable X-Change rate but that they need a little more time before this can be fixed. Henk Ramdien, President of Suralco, when questioned on this matter has explained that it is not only the Bauxite Companies but all producing companies have sufferd losses because of the 396 rate.

SCHOOLS REMAIN CLOSED

VOJ and VOS schools will remain closed because of the political actions that are being carried out by the joint forces unit (Opposition/Labor/Business group). According to reports, the Principals of the schools have been asked to turn in their keys. This has been refused because of the inventory that has to take place before the keys are turned in. Robby Naarendorp, Chairman of the FOLS asked himself if President Wijdenbosch was serious about talks of dialogue because since his speech on the 25th of November when he said that he would like to hold talks with the different parties they have not received any conformation from the President's side for this. Naarendorp stated that the goverment continues to carry out their policy by fulfilling the wishes of the coalition partners and appointing new people for the open posts. As an example Naarendorp gave the appointment of the under minister of education Raymond Sapoen. According to Naarendorp the FOLS had answered an invitation of the Minister of Education on the 10 of November to speak about the problems in the Educational sector. The FOLS had given the Minister a written report and had asked for an early reply. They have not received any reaction as yet from the Minister. Parents are being threatened that their children will be written off if they do not send them to school. This is another problem for the parents because when the children are sent to school they are faced with closed doors and they then roam around the town for the rest of the day. According to Naarendorp the government had promised to seek a solution for this problem but 4 weeks have already gone by without any positive reaction from the governments side. Instead of seeking a solution we now see that teachers are being threatened with transfers to the interior if they didn't return to their jobs. These threats however are not bothering the teachers, even the policy of no work no pay did not have any effect on the protest actions.

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