Many people probably felt a strong sense of déjà vu last week. ABOP chairman and vice-chairman of the National Assembly (DNA) Ronnie Brunswijk has once again shouted loudly from the rooftops that this can no longer be the case and that he wants to pull the plug on the coalition. But he has threatened that so often that it lacks any credibility.
Text Armand Snijders
Image FB NDP & DNA
In conversation with ‘ABC Actueel’, Brunswijk did what he does best: showing muscles without actually hitting. This time, President Jennifer Geerlings-Simons is the target of his verbal arrows. According to Brunswijk, the NDP is not adhering to agreements and Abop directors and loyalists at ministries and parastatal institutions are being “thrown to the sharks”. And so we hear the familiar threat: “When the bucket overflows, what will happen? Then we’ll get out.”
“In a coalition you are partners, not hostages of each other’s insatiable hunger for lucrative posts and appointments”
Deeply sad
The recipe is classic: the bucket is full and if the treatment of the yellow-black party does not change immediately, Brunswijk will leave the coalition with his party. However, in reality we are watching a political soap opera that no one attaches any importance to. You could see it as a comic spectacle if it weren’t so deeply sad for the country.
After all, Brunswijk’s bucket must have the largest capacity in Surinamese history and offer more space than the famous bucket full of holes of then president Ronald Venetiaan. After all, we saw it constantly during the reign of Chandrikapersad Santokhi between 2020 and 2025. At that time, the bucket was also full almost every week. Do you remember the countless times that Brunswijk fussed and turned to the media because the VHP was going to pass him?
When the then Minister of Land Policy and Forest Management, Dinotha Vorswijk, was under fire for questionable land matters, Brunswijk threatened to pull the plug on the coalition if the VHP came to ‘his’ ministry. The result? Nothing changed, Abop stayed stuck on the plush.
Bottomless pit
And what about the issue surrounding the quarreling ministers and the troubles at the Port Management? Brunswijk also shouted again and again that “the measure is enough” and that he will not be messed with. But as soon as the water threatened to hit the edge, a concession was quickly made behind the scenes – usually in the form of land, posts or budgets – after which the water level magically dropped. The bucket turned out to be a bottomless pit.
The pattern is no different under Geerlings-Simons. Brunswijk roars in the media, creates artificial crisis meetings and then sits down for a “long and penetrating” conversation. “The president has given me her word, so I’m going to wait,” Brunswijk calmed things down recently after yet another ‘crisis’. And behold: the storm in a teacup had subsided again. Until the next incident ignites it again.
Divine revelation
The credibility of Brunswijk’s political ultimatums has now reached absolute zero. After all, the Surinamese voter still vividly remembers the run-up to the May 2025 elections. On every political stage and during every weekly meeting of the Council of Ministers, the then vice-president declared with a stony face that he had sat on a mountain in the interior for days and had received a direct ‘revelation from God Almighty’ there: Abop would pass the historic limit of at least one hundred thousand votes – and he would become president.
In fact, he tied his political fate to it: “If I don’t get a hundred thousand votes, I will quit politics in Suriname. That means that society does not support me,” was the solemn promise. Even on election day, he triumphantly shouted at the polling station that the “first of the 100K” had already arrived.
Comfortable seat
Everyone knows how this farce ended: the magical hundred thousand turned out to be a pipe dream, society did not give him that massive support. But do you think Brunswijk packed his bags? Well no, the so-called divine calling was silently exchanged for a comfortable seat in DNA. A man a man, a word a word? Not in the yellow-black mathematics of Brunswijk.
By the way, he had to exchange his job as vice president for the vice chairmanship of DNA. Because Geerlings-Simons had no interest in his blackmail policy with which he could paralyze everything. She much preferred NPS chairman Gregory Russia in that post. At least he is loyal and docile. But Brunswijk has been looking for revenge ever since and is now training things in other ways.
(read more below the photo)
Progress country lame
The eternal tug-of-war over dolls is no longer innocent. While Brunswijk complains in parliament that Abop executives at Grassalco, the Telecommunications Authority of Suriname and the Canawaima ferry connection are being thwarted, the country’s real progress is paralyzed.
The real price of this political wrangling is being paid in the social sector. The Geerlings-Simons government promised with much fanfare a large-scale National Housing Program to alleviate the acute housing shortage. Hundreds of social homes would be delivered at locations such as Reeberg and Voorburg. What now appears? The pace is hopelessly slow and the annual goals for 2026 have been officially declared unattainable. Why? Because ministers and directors at the relevant ministries are more concerned with their political survival and protecting their party mandate than with managing contractors.
Anything but a constructive attitude
Even at international level, Suriname is shooting itself in the foot. The Program for Country Partnership signed in New York with the UN organization Unido must mobilize billions in green investments and agro-industrial projects. But the question is whether this will succeed. Because foreign investors are not crazy either and closely follow political developments in Suriname.
Due to Brunswijk’s anything but constructive attitude, the image they have of Suriname is not exactly positive. How are you going to convince those foreigners to open their pockets to set up special economic zones if the DNA vice-president continuously threatens to blow up the entire government? For example, just about who gets to sit in the chair of the director of a parastatal company?
Frontal attack on NDP
What makes the analysis extra spicy this time is Brunswijk’s frontal attack on the largest coalition partner. “The NDP just thinks it won the election,” he grumbled. “But the NDP did not win the elections. The NDP has eighteen seats and with eighteen seats you are not going to do anything.”
It’s a logic that even a primary school student would wonder about. Of course, eighteen seats is not an absolute majority in parliament. But the NDP is the largest, so what was he trying to convey with his rather ill-considered statement?
“A man a man, a word a word? Not in the yellow-black mathematics of Brunswijk”
He apparently conveniently forgets that Abop only has six seats and is one of many parties within the coalition. The arrogance with which he demands that he be allowed to call the shots for every change is therefore in stark contrast to reality. Moreover: in a coalition you are partners, not hostages of each other’s insatiable hunger for lucrative posts and appointments.
However, Brunswijk knows full well that he will not leave the government at all. After all, outside the coalition the job machine dries up immediately. The threats are nothing more than a political bluff – a tactic to force Geerlings-Simons to compromise. The bucket may be overflowing, but as long as the political benefits continue to flow, Brunswijk and his Abop vassals will remain in their posts. And the people? He looks at this theater with a tired smile and is allowed to hold the mop as usual.
