Need for Change

Need for Change

July 28, 2026

The first condition for lasting change is Need for Change: the reali-zation that things can no longer continue as they are and that change has become unavoidable. Without that awareness, everything remains the same. People may recognize that problems exist, but they do not feel a sufficient sense of urgency to do something about them.

The question is whether Curaçao has ever truly met that first con-dition.

I was reminded of this when I thought back to November 1999. During the opening of the Kurá Hulanda Conference Center, a three-day international symposium was held under the theme Making the Con-nection to the 21st Century. I was one of the organizers on behalf of Arthur Andersen, commissioned by Jacob Gelt Dekker.

One of the keynote speakers was Ruth Richardson, the former Min-ister of Finance of New Zealand. She had successfully implemented far-reaching economic reforms in her country in a remarkably short period and was widely regarded as an international authority on pub-lic sector reform.

After meeting with many of Curaçao's most influential leaders, she reached a striking conclusion. Very little would change on the island because there was no sense of urgency. The need for real change simply was not felt strongly enough.

More than a quarter of a century later, that observation remains remarkably relevant.

Take the Country Package (Landspakket). Its implementation has been slow and far behind the original schedule. There are many rea-sons for this, but one of them, in my view, is that the need for change is still not felt broadly enough, particularly within parts of the estab-lished system. As long as the pain of maintaining the status quo is perceived to be less than the effort required to change, meaningful reform will remain elusive.

When significant change does occur in Curaçao, it is often the re-sult of strong external pressure—from the Netherlands, the IMF, the Board of Financial Supervision (Cft), the courts, or simply a crisis. In other words, the sense of urgency usually comes from the outside rather than from within.

Perhaps that is the most important question we should ask our-selves. Will we once again wait until the next crisis forces us to change? Or are we finally prepared to acknowledge that the time for postponement has passed?

Because without Need for Change, every vision, every plan, and every reform ultimately remains nothing more than a good intention.

Miguel Goede