WILLEMSTAD - Vidanova Pension Fund has purchased the southern portion of the Oostpunt lands, which have been owned by the Maal family since 1868. The terrain encompasses an area of 1089 hectares.
The sale involves a sum of around forty million guilders.
Vidanova has established a separate BV (Limited Liability Company) for the acquisition of the lands, but portions of the properties have also been allocated to separate investment companies such as Eastpoint Development and Pelican Creek Curaçao.
Oostpunt
The area commonly known as Oostpunt includes the plantations of Klein Sint Joris, Oranjeberg, Fuik, Duivelsklip, and Oostpunt, along with adjacent land and water plots, covering approximately 4400 hectares.
These plantations were gradually purchased from previous private owners by Willem Pieter Maal (1839-1888). He was a second-generation Curaçaoan and a highly successful entrepreneur and merchant who owned numerous buildings, warehouses, shipyards, and docks on both the Punda and Otrabanda sides of Willemstad.
Maal also owned numerous sailing ships that transported cargo between the islands, South America, Panama, and Europe.
Around 1870, Maal sold his shipyards, docks, and shipbuilding facilities in Willemstad to S.E.L. Maduro, the founder of SEL Maduro & Sons. With the proceeds from this sale, Maal then invested in real estate in the eastern part of Curaçao.
Maal purchased the Fuik plantation, followed by the Duivelsklip and Oostpunt plantations. Around 1872, Maal also acquired the already-owned Santa Barbara plantation, adjacent to the Fuik plantation.
Industrialization
On the Santa Barbara plantation, Maal, together with his cousin Michael Brown Gorsira (father of Cornelis "Sjon Nene" Gorsira), established the Curacaosche Phosphate Maatschappij NV. The Curaçao Phosphate Company became the first major industry on Curaçao and transformed the economy from an agrarian-based economy to an industrialized one.
With the proceeds from the highly successful phosphate mining, Maal purchased the remaining Klein Sint Joris and Oranjeberg plantations, consolidating ownership of the entire eastern end of the island under one owner.
Despite numerous conflicts and disputes during long periods, the highly profitable Sta Barbara Mining Company transformed the colony of Curaçao from a gloomy, debt-ridden, agriculture-based economy with high unemployment, dependent on the Dutch government, into a self-sufficient industrialized economy with almost full employment since 1875.
Employer
It was thanks to the Mining Company that Curaçao achieved budget surpluses for the first time in history and did not require financial assistance from the Motherland, Holland.
Until the establishment of the Curaçao Petroleum Industry in 1917, the SHELL refinery, the Curacao Mining Company, was the largest employer on the island, employing up to nearly 600 workers at times.
In addition to being a major shareholder in the Curacao Mining Company, WP Maal had become the largest landowner in the eastern part of Curaçao by 1879, with land extending from St. Joris Bay on the north coast to Oostpunt and back to Fuik Bay on the south coast.
In these areas and plantations, Maal engaged in extensive agriculture, livestock farming, mining, quarries, and forestry. Fuik and Klein Sint Joris, in particular, were used for extensive livestock farming (mostly goats and sheep), utilizing the warehouses and docks at Fuik Bay to ship livestock, produce, and products to the city of Willemstad and other islands.
Data even indicate transportation of products and livestock to Suriname and South Carolina in those days, demonstrating the scale of the activities.
Willem Pieter Maal I passed away at a young age on November 2, 1888, at the age of 49. His enterprises and efforts were continued under the care of his widow, Eliza Maal-Guilhoux, until her death in 1923, and then the heirs of W.P. Maal and the widow Maal-Guilhoux.
As such, the properties passed on to the direct descendants of Willem P. Maal, Eliza Maal-Guilhoux († 1920), Joseph Michael Maal († 1933), Dr. Willem Pieter ("Willy") Maal († 1959), and Willem Pieter "Boy" Maal († 1998), and currently the heirs of "Boy" Maal.