Klesch group

This is for the ones that don’t understand the deal with Klesch and pretend that we sold our heritage for $ 1,-.

The hard reality is that Curacao is presently in a dire position. Thousands are going to lose their jobs because of the end of the PDVSA contract and national political problems. The government through RDK (Curaçao Refinery) organized a public tender in order to find a new operator for the refinery facilitating the guarantee of about 1.500 direct jobs and thousands of other indirect additional ones. Among these we must consider companies such as CPA, KTK, Contractors and Shipping Agencies just to name a few.

We must also keep in mind that the oil business worldwide is in a downward spiral. On top of this our refinery is in a deplorable condition and various different environmental foundations have filed multimillion-dollar suits against them claiming environmental pollution. This means that the government has the almost impossible task of seeking a new operator in order to be able to guarantee thousands of jobs and at the same time invest in the so desperately needed maintenance in order to minimize pollution during refinement.

The only way that they are going to be able to find interested parties is by including our Curacao Oil Terminal (COT) in the total deal. The refinery alone is not attractive enough to be able to trigger interested parties. In order to be able to guarantee all this the government through RDK decided to sign a contract with the Klesch group which includes a rent of $ 14 million a year together with a so-called throughput charge for an additional $ 12 million a year.

Considering our painful situation this deal could not be better. Thousands of jobs have been guaranteed, which was the priority and most important objective, and continuation of the refinery and all having to do with it. And as icing on the cake they negotiated an additional $ 26 million for the government every year. Mind you, all this was managed for the $ 1,-, that every day again, is ridiculed through radio broadcasting, by the many ignorant fellow citizens.

We must stop making this a political game. Thousands of jobs are on the line. I sincerely hope that my explanation helps clarify the misconception that the culprits are continually trying to convince the people of.




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