by Armand Snijders
PARAMARIBO — The way in which President Jennifer Geerlings-Simons has tackled the delicate issue surrounding the possible pardon of those convicted of the December murders has earned her a lot of praise. She has shown that she is a president for all Surinamese and not just for a certain political clique.
With her decision not to pardon Benny Brondenstein, Stephanus Dendoe, Ernst Gefferie and the fugitive Iwan Dijksteel, she has also checkmated her party colleague Ramon Abrahams. The vice-chairman of the National Democratic Party (NDP), who argued for the pardon together with lawyer Irvin Kanhai, has made it painfully clear that she is the boss and not outlawed party bosses.
“For the sake of the future, Geerlings-Simons has turned a page. That is perhaps a more important milestone than when she became the first woman to accept the presidency”
After Geerlings-Simons succeeded the refugee Desi Bouterse as chairman of the NDP last year, it was expected that his possible pardon would be on the plate of the new head of state. Particularly if the party were to regain government power and be allowed to provide the president.
Abrahams also wanted to become chairman, especially because as president he would want to grant this pardon. But he lost the battle within the NDP by a wide margin to Geerlings-Simons, who indeed became the boss of Suriname after the elections of May 25 of this year.
Self-amnesty law
However, Bouterse’s pardon was no longer an issue at that time, because he had died at the end of last year. That saved her at least one dilemma, because Geerlings-Simons was also a loyal Boutist who considered his persecution to be political. As president of the National Assembly, she even put to the vote in April 2012 a bill to expand the Amnesty Act of 1989 – what was popularly called the self-amnesty law – and thus end the December criminal trial.
By the way, it is striking that this proposal to change the law was submitted at the time by, among others, NDP Assembly members Melvin Bouva, André Misiekaba and Ricardo Panka. According to sources, it is no coincidence that the first two have been included by Geerlings-Simons as ministers in her cabinet and that Panka is in the running for an ambassadorial post. This happened after the president received guarantees that they would not support any requests for clemency for those convicted of the December murders.
This means that Geerlings-Simons had already taken into account that this would happen. In doing so, she took a lot of wind out of the sails of Abrahams and Kanhai in advance and was now able to sideline them. By the way, the fact that Kanhai had not even submitted a signed petition from the imprisoned Gefferie, Dendoe and Brondenstein was very stupid and made it very easy for the president not to honor the lawyer’s request.
Old revolutionary guard
For the old revolutionary guard within the NDP, led by Abrahams – and to a lesser extent Laurens Neede – the rejection will be a bitter pill to swallow. They are largely stuck in the dark past of the military dictatorship and cannot accept that there is now a party member in power who does not want to dwell too much on it.
For the sake of the future, Geerlings-Simons has turned a page. That is perhaps a more important milestone than when she became the first woman to accept the presidency. On her future path she will encounter many vicious stings and opponents – also within her own circles – who want to eliminate her. But in any case, she has won this important battle and with it the hearts of many Surinamese.
