WILLEMSTAD - The problems at the On Vacation hotel in Piscadera are still not solved. It escalated this week at the former Clarion hotel when a group of 200 tourists from Colombia ran amok.

They are angry because they have not received food for two days, while that is included in the price. The reason is that the company that runs the kitchen and the restaurant has not been paid for four months by the owners of the hotel.

The outstanding account is now at around 800,000 guilders. The Curaçao Tourist Board (CTB) was asked to intervene because the situation is not good for the Curaçao name in Colombia.

This week it also became clear that the staff has not yet received a salary and has therefore laid down their work. Kenneth Valpoort of the Horecaf trade union announced that he had warned the management of the hotel in advance that this would be the consequence, namely that the staff would go on strike while the hotel is full of guests.

Valpoort says that he also had contact with Hugo Clarinda of the CTB and Minister of Labor Hensley Koeiman more than a week ago but nothing has happened. “And now we see that it got out of hands,” says the union leader.

Employees who showed up at work yesterday morning were not admitted to the building on arrival. According to a staff member, local employees were replaced by foreign staff. When Minister Hensley Koeiman heard this, he came to the hotel to see the situation for himself, but he did not get the information he was looking for because the management was not present.