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March 5, 2009
bron The Daily Herald
THE HAGUE - A Saban resident has turned to the Dutch Government and to the Second Chamber to address the problem of registering his marriage to a person of the same sex.
The man in question, whose name will not be mentioned in this article for reasons of privacy, sent an email to Parliament's permanent committees of Home Affairs and Kingdom Relations BZK and Antillean and Aruban Affairs NAAZ on January 30, 2009.
The man turned to Dutch Parliament because of, as he stated, "the refusal" of the local government office in Saba to register his marriage to a local Saban man and to grant him "the right to access the naturalisation test/process." The marriage was conducted in Amsterdam. In the Netherlands, same sex marriages are legal.
"They simply refused me, telling me that my marriage is not accepted because it is a gay marriage, meaning same sex marriage is not accepted on Saba," he stated. He said he knew about the ruling of the Supreme Court of the Netherlands which has stated that a same sex marriage performed in the Netherlands must be acknowledged on the islands.
The Second Chamber also took a decision to this respect, which gives gay marriages the same status as 'regular' heterosexual marriages. The Dutch Constitution defines a marriage as a bond between two persons. It doesn't specify the sex of the persons, whereas the Antillean law states that a marriage has to be between a man and a woman.
The man on Saba is not the first person encountering problems with the registration of a same sex marriage, conducted in the Netherlands, on the islands of the Netherlands Antilles and Aruba. Several other homosexual couples have had the same problem. Following the ruling by the Supreme Court, the Dutch Government has informed the islands that same sex marriages must be registered at the Census Offices on the islands.
The letter from Saba was brought up during Wednesday's meeting of the NAAZ committee. Member of Parliament for the Labour Party PvdA John Leerdam raised the issue and said there was a lack of clarity on the islands about the status of same sex marriages sealed in the Netherlands.
Leerdam said that PvdA stood 100 per cent behind same sex marriages, which he said should be acknowledged in all parts of the Dutch Kingdom. In due time, gay couples should also be allowed to get married on the BES islands, Bonaire, Saba and St. Eustatius once they become part of the Netherlands as a public entity.
Leerdam wanted to know if the Dutch Government shared the opinion of the PvdA on the status of same sex marriages. State Secretary of Kingdom Relations Ank Bijleveld-Schouten repeated the Dutch standpoint on this issue: same sex marriages have to be acknowledged and allowed to be registered on all islands.
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