Naturalización administrada por Sint Maarten

Dutch nationality is a Kingdom affair (Statuut voor het Koninkrijk der Nederlanden art 3(1)(c)), so the conditions for naturalisation are the same in Philipsburg as in Amsterdam: they are set by the Rijkswet op het Nederlanderschap, in force in its present consolidated form since 1 October 2023. What changes in Sint Maarten is who receives the request, who advises on it, what it costs, in which currency, and which language you must show alongside Dutch.

The request is lodged with, and investigated by, the Cabinet of the Governor of Sint Maarten (Besluit verkrijging en verlies Nederlanderschap art 45). The Governor represents the King in Aruba, Curacao and Sint Maarten (Statuut art 2). The Governor's advice then travels to the Minister in The Hague through the Minister of Justice of Sint Maarten, who adds an advice of his own (RWN art 7(2); BVVN art 50). The decision itself is a Koninklijk Besluit signed by the King on the proposal of the Minister of Justice and Security, and the nationality it confers is valid throughout the Kingdom.

One correction to a common misdescription: the receiving body is the Cabinet of the Governor, not the Civil Registry or Census Office. Our sources found no role for a civil-registry body in the nationality chain in Sint Maarten, and in this respect Sint Maarten is administered exactly like Aruba and Curacao. All statements are as at 25 July 2026.

• El artículo 3 del estatuto establece la nacionalidad como competencia exclusiva del Reino (rijkscompetentie); RWN es rijkswet y se aplica en todo el Reino independientemente de la residencia del país constituyente..

• AW/CW/SX constitucionalmente igual a NL dentro del Reino (Artículo 1 del Estatuto); cada uno tiene su propia legislatura (Staten van Aruba/Curaçao/Sint Maarten); la competencia de residencia es local; la nacionalidad es Reino…

Residence. Five years of admission (toelating) and main residence (hoofdverblijf) immediately preceding the request (RWN art 8(1)(c)). The five years aggregate across the whole Kingdom - the statute lists the European Netherlands, Aruba, Curacao, Sint Maarten and the Caribbean Netherlands disjunctively, so time on another island counts. The period drops to two years for a person with at least ten years of admission and main residence in those territories in total (art 8(3)), and to three years for an unmarried person who has cohabited for three years in a durable relationship with an unmarried Dutch national, or who is stateless (art 8(4)). It falls away altogether for a person who has at some time held Dutch nationality or the status of Dutch subject-non-national, for a person who has for at least three years been the spouse of and cohabits with a Dutch national, and for a person adopted as an adult in the Kingdom by parents at least one of whom is Dutch (art 8(2)). Admission is governed by Sint Maarten's own Landsverordening toelating en uitzetting, in force since 30 May 2015, under which a permit is granted by or on behalf of the Minister.

Language and integration. This is the one substantive condition that genuinely varies by island. Article 8(1)(d) RWN requires knowledge of Dutch and - for an applicant with main residence in the Caribbean parts of the Kingdom - of the language current on the island of residence. On Sint Maarten that is English. The requirement is cumulative, not a choice. The level is A2 of the Common European Framework across all four skills - speaking, listening, writing and reading - and it is A2, not B1 (Besluit naturalisatietoets arts 2, 3(1)(h)(2) and 5(1)). The test for Sint Maarten is set by the Minister after consultation with the Minister of Justice of Sint Maarten (art 2(2)). The Caribbean parts of the Kingdom issue a certificaat rather than a diploma.

Character. The request is refused where, on the basis of the applicant's conduct, serious suspicions exist that he presents a danger to public order, good morals or the security of the Kingdom (RWN art 9(1)(a)). There is no Verklaring Omtrent het Gedrag in this procedure: the instruments are a signed declaration on residence and conduct, an extract from the judicial-records service obtained by the IND, and a police-systems check. The quantified refusal thresholds and the five-year rehabilitation period (raised from four years with effect from 1 May 2018) are pinned in the European-Netherlands policy manual; the Curacao and Sint Maarten edition of the manual was not decoded for this page, so confirm the local figures before relying on them.

Renunciation. An applicant who holds another nationality must in principle do what is possible to lose it (RWN art 9(1)(b)), unless that cannot reasonably be required. Four exemptions are statutory (art 9(3)): nationals covered by the Second Protocol of 2 February 1993 to the 1963 Strasbourg Convention; a person born in the Netherlands, Aruba, Curacao or Sint Maarten who has main residence there at the time of the request; a person married to a Dutch national; and a person recognised as a refugee in one of those territories. The second of these is the one most often engaged on Sint Maarten.

Solidarity. The applicant must be willing to make the verklaring van verbondenheid, the declaration of solidarity with the constitutional order of the Kingdom (RWN arts 8(1)(e) and 23(2)); the wording is fixed by statute and is always made in Dutch.

The main rule is that a holder of an ordinary residence permit proves identity and nationality with a legalised or apostilled foreign birth certificate and a valid foreign passport. Departure from it requires either evidentiary impossibility (bewijsnood) or disproportionality in the individual case.

The usual civil-status set is: the applicant's own birth certificate; birth certificates of any children included in the request, with the adoption deed or judgment for an adopted child; the marriage certificate where the request rests on marriage to a Dutch national; and divorce or repudiation deeds, or a family booklet where the country of origin uses one. The divorce documents are required to test for an existing second marriage, which must be dissolved before nationality is granted. The birth certificate matters because it establishes the applicant's names under his own law and whether he has a surname at all.

Evidentiary impossibility is accepted for a civil-status deed where such deeds are or were never drawn up in that country, where the register was lost, or where the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has advised that deeds should not temporarily be required from that country; and for a passport where the person is stateless or the same kind of advice applies. A person registered as stateless need not produce a foreign passport, but a registration of "unknown nationality" is expressly not the same as stateless. Holders of asylum permits may produce a Dutch refugee passport or alien's passport instead, on the principle that they may not be sent back to the authorities of the country they fled - subject to four counter-indications, including having obtained a document from those authorities, or having travelled there voluntarily, after the asylum permit was granted.

The legalisation chain has an unresolved gap. The policy manual in force since 1 July 2026 instructs officials to apply "the legalisation circulaire currently in force", but the most recent located version (Stcrt. 2023, 8509) is recorded as repealed with effect from 1 January 2024 and no successor could be found. Confirm the current requirement with the Cabinet of the Governor before paying for legalisation. Translations must be made by a sworn translator and physically attached to the original or certified copy; the set of languages that triggers a translation requirement in Sint Maarten is not established here (in the European Netherlands the trigger is any language other than Dutch, English, German or French).

The request must be lodged in person; a proxy is admitted only for compelling reasons (BVVN art 3(1)-(2)). It can be lodged only with the authority of the place where the applicant is registered or has main residence - requests brought to the wrong authority are not accepted.

The Cabinet of the Governor first checks the fee position: unless the applicant is exempt or payment is fully waived, the fee is paid on filing, and the file is not taken into treatment until then (BVVN art 46(2)). The Governor then investigates residence status, the other conditions and the fixing of names, and cross-checks the declared particulars with the other authorities of the Kingdom, which are obliged to cooperate within the periods set in the decree (BVVN art 47).

The file then follows a double-advice chain that exists only in Aruba, Curacao and Sint Maarten. The Governor sends his advice to the Minister in The Hague through the Minister of Justice of Sint Maarten, who adds his own advice to the file (BVVN arts 48(5), 49 and 50; the statutory hook is RWN art 7(2)). The IND assesses; if the outcome is positive the Minister proposes the applicant to the King and a Royal Decree is issued. The extracts are then returned to the authority of the applicant's place of residence for handover. A refusal goes directly to the applicant with the objection deadline stated, and is notified at the same time to the Governor and to the Minister of Justice of Sint Maarten.

Nationality vests neither on the decree date nor on the day of the letter, but on the physical handover of the personal extract - and then backdates to the date the decree bears (BVVN art 60b(1)). Where a declaration of solidarity is required, the extract may not be handed over until it has actually been made (RWN art 23(2); BVVN art 60b(3)). Because of the backdating, a new fact arising between the decree date and the handover does not reopen the assessment.

The statutory decision period is the Kingdom-wide one: one year, running not from filing but from the latest of payment of the fee, the decision fully waiving payment, or receipt of the supplementary material requested for the assessment (RWN art 9(4)). The decision may then be held (aangehouden) at most twice by six months, giving an outer limit of two years. On a positive outcome the period ends only when the applicant takes receipt of the notification, in principle at a ceremony.

Real elapsed time in Sint Maarten is materially different from the European Netherlands, and the published figures should be read before setting expectations. Across 2018 to 2024, 67 per cent of granted requests filed in Sint Maarten reached a ceremony within a year of filing - 488 of 732 - against 82 per cent for requests filed in the European Netherlands (IND, Monitor Naturalisatie en Optie 2018-2024, June 2025, Table 7). Of files filed in Sint Maarten, 58 per cent reached the IND two to three months after submission, where two-thirds of European-Netherlands files arrive within a fortnight. Once at the IND, decisions on grants filed in Sint Maarten split roughly evenly between those taken within three months and those taking longer. The Cabinet of the Governor of Sint Maarten publishes no processing-time figure of its own.

After the Royal Decree, the person must be summoned within six weeks of the date the decree bears, extendable by a reasonable period for special circumstances (BVVN art 60b(2)), and the handover must take place within six weeks of the summons being sent (BVVN art 60b(7)). The hard backstop is one year: if the extract has not been handed over within a year of the date the decree bears, the decree lapses by operation of law, the person has not become Dutch, and a fresh request is needed (BVVN art 60b(11)). No objection or appeal lies against that lapse. Practice allows up to three summonses, the third by registered post, and where fewer than three invitations were sent inside the year the decree is treated as handed over in time.

Sint Maarten charges in Caribbean guilder (Cg, ISO code XCG), which replaced the Netherlands Antillean guilder for Curacao and Sint Maarten on 31 March 2025. The 2026 tariffs, in force since 1 January 2026, are set by WBN-CM 2025/3 (Stcrt. 2025, 31847 of 19 September 2025), which sets a single table for Curacao and Sint Maarten:

• naturalisation, single applicant, standard: Cg 2,373
• naturalisation, joint applicants, standard: Cg 3,029
• naturalisation, single applicant, reduced: Cg 1,765
• naturalisation, joint applicants, reduced: Cg 2,423
• each co-naturalising minor child: Cg 350

The reduced tariff is for an adult applicant who is stateless or holds an asylum residence permit or a comparable permit in the Caribbean parts of the Kingdom (Besluit optie- en naturalisatiegelden 2002, art 3(2)). Note that the Cabinet of the Governor of Sint Maarten publishes only the standard figures on its own page and omits the reduced ones entirely - a stateless applicant or recognised refugee reading that page alone would over-pay.

The 2026 uplift for Curacao and Sint Maarten was 13.8 per cent, against 4.4 per cent for the euro amounts, because the conversion is made at the exchange rate of the preceding 1 July. Each column is a legally fixed amount in its own currency; do not convert from the euro figures.

Separately, the naturalisation test carries its own examination fees, charged in Sint Maarten by the Dienst Examens: Cg 275 for part I, Cg 225 for part II and Cg 110 for part III, with resit fees of Cg 140 for part I, Cg 75 for a single element of part II, Cg 225 for more than three elements of part II, Cg 37 for a single element of part III and Cg 110 for more than three language skills of part III.

Payment is made to the Governor, in a single instalment, and must arrive within six weeks of the request being received or the request is set aside without being handled (Besluit optie- en naturalisatiegelden 2002, arts 5 and 6). The consolidated fee decree on wetten.overheid.nl still prints 2011 base amounts in Netherlands Antillean guilder; those are not payable.

RWN Artículo 7 + SX Landsverordening

ID de fuente	Cita

Recuento de pines: 6.

The Algemene wet bestuursrecht does not apply in Sint Maarten. The governing statute is the Landsverordening administratieve rechtspraak of 3 August 2001 (P.B. 2001 no. 79), in force since 1 December 2001 and continued as Sint Maarten law after 10 October 2010. The chain is:

• objection (bezwaar) to the body that took the decision, within six weeks of the day the decision was given (LAR art 56(1));
• appeal (beroep) to the Gerecht in eerste aanleg, within six weeks (LAR art 16(1)), court fee NAf 150 (art 17(1));
• further appeal (hoger beroep) to the Gemeenschappelijk Hof van Justitie, within six weeks, at double the first-instance fee, NAf 300 (LAR arts 75(1), 76 and 77(1)).

Two cautions. The appellate court for a Sint Maarten decision is the Gemeenschappelijk Hof van Justitie, not the Afdeling bestuursrechtspraak van de Raad van State, which sits at the top of the European-Netherlands chain only. And the LAR prints its court fees in Netherlands Antillean guilder, while the currency of Sint Maarten since 31 March 2025 is the Caribbean guilder; confirm the operative amount with the registry before filing.

Whether the Dutch penalty-payment regime for late decisions is available against the Governor is not established here and should not be assumed.

Separately, where the dispute is not about a decision but about whether a person is or is not Dutch, the route is a petition under Article 17 RWN. For a resident of Sint Maarten that petition goes to the Gemeenschappelijk Hof van Justitie rather than to the rechtbank Den Haag - the forum follows residence, not the nationality claimed. Only cassation lies against the outcome (RWN art 18(2)), and once final the decision binds every body charged with executing any statutory scheme (art 19).

• The credential does not travel, even though the residence clock does. Five years of residence aggregate across the whole Kingdom, but a naturalisation-test certificate annotated for English is recognised only on the islands where English is current alongside Dutch (Besluit naturalisatietoets art 5(3)). Someone who spent three years on Curacao and two on Sint Maarten and applies in Sint Maarten satisfies the residence condition on the aggregate - but a Papiamentu-annotated certificate obtained on Curacao will not be accepted for a Sint Maarten application, and an English-annotated one obtained on Sint Maarten will not be accepted on Curacao, Aruba or Bonaire. The Dutch-language element of the certificate is recognised Kingdom-wide (art 5(2)); only the island-language element is territorially limited. Moving between the two language zones preserves your residence and destroys your test credential.
• A gap in lawful residence does not pause the clock, it resets it. Where a renewed permit does not directly follow the previous one, the required period starts again from zero. There is no gap where the extension was applied for in time and the conditions were met at that moment, or where the new permit is granted immediately consecutive to the old one.
• Absence rules bite on main residence. Relocation abroad is assumed where the person has stayed outside the country for more than six consecutive months, unless the overrun was beyond his fault, and where for the third consecutive year he has stayed away for more than four consecutive months, unless he shows the centre of his activities has not moved.
• The Second Protocol exemption from renunciation is not what it appears. Since 4 June 2010 the Netherlands is the only party, so the treaty provisions are not applied in practice; the exemption survives because since 1 April 2003 it extends to the Protocol's target groups regardless of whether the person's state is a party. Secondary sources regularly get this wrong.
• The provision that disapplies the residence condition for adults adopted in the Kingdom names only the Netherlands, Aruba, Curacao and Sint Maarten and omits the Caribbean Netherlands, unlike the fully enumerated lists elsewhere in the same article. Whether that omission is deliberate is unresolved and should not be resolved by inference.
• Naturalisation must be applied for in the place where you actually live. The Cabinet of the Governor of Sint Maarten may only take requests from people registered or resident there; a request lodged elsewhere in the Kingdom is not accepted.

• Statuut voor het Koninkrijk der Nederlanden, arts 1, 2 and 3(1)(c): https://wetten.overheid.nl/BWBR0002154
• Rijkswet op het Nederlanderschap, consolidated text in force since 1 October 2023, no amendment in force as at 25 July 2026: https://wetten.overheid.nl/BWBR0003738/2023-10-01 - arts 7, 8, 9, 17, 18, 19 and 23
• Besluit verkrijging en verlies Nederlanderschap, in force since 1 March 2017: https://wetten.overheid.nl/BWBR0013605 - arts 2, 3, 45 to 50 and 60b
• Besluit naturalisatietoets, in force since 26 May 2022: https://wetten.overheid.nl/BWBR0013604/2022-05-26 - arts 2, 3, 4 and 5
• Handleiding Rijkswet op het Nederlanderschap 2003 (European-Netherlands policy manual), in force since 1 July 2026: https://wetten.overheid.nl/BWBW33099; the Curacao and Sint Maarten edition (BWBR0026494), also in force since 1 July 2026, was not decoded for this page
• Besluit optie- en naturalisatiegelden 2002, in force since 1 January 2011 (rules only; printed amounts are 2011 base figures and are not payable): https://wetten.overheid.nl/BWBR0013782
• WBN-CM 2025/3, Stcrt. 2025, 31847 of 19 September 2025, in force 1 January 2026 - 2026 fee and examination-fee tables for Curacao and Sint Maarten: https://zoek.officielebekendmakingen.nl/stcrt-2025-31847.html
• Landsverordening administratieve rechtspraak (Sint Maarten), Landsverordening of 3 August 2001, P.B. 2001 no. 79: https://repository.officiele-overheidspublicaties.nl/CVDR/CVDR141999/1/html/141999_1.html
• Landsverordening toelating en uitzetting (Sint Maarten), in force since 30 May 2015: https://lokaleregelgeving.overheid.nl/CVDR142597
• IND, Monitor Naturalisatie en Optie 2018-2024, June 2025 (processing-time figures)
• Kabinet van de Gouverneur van Sint Maarten (consulted 25 July 2026): https://www.kabgsxm.com/consular-dutch-nationality.aspx?language=NL