Suri­name has de­clared two days of na­tion­al mourn­ing ahead of Sat­ur­day’s state fu­ner­al for for­mer pres­i­dent Jules Wi­j­den­bosch.

Wi­j­den­bosch, who served as head of state in the Dutch-speak­ing Caribbean Com­mu­ni­ty (CARI­COM) coun­try be­tween 1996 to 2000, died on April 30—two days be­fore his 84th birth­day.

The au­thor­i­ties said dur­ing the two days of na­tion­al mourn­ing, the flags are flown at half-mast.

“Words fail to de­scribe this loss. May it be a com­fort that we will cher­ish his mem­o­ry in our hearts for­ev­er. We owe him a great debt of grat­i­tude for his years of con­tri­bu­tion to the de­vel­op­ment of our Re­pub­lic. May he now rest from his labours and may the eter­nal light shine up­on him for the length of his days—that is our wish and prayer,” said Pres­i­dent Chan­drikaper­sad Chan San­tokhi, af­ter sign­ing the con­do­lence book.

The gov­ern­ment said that out of re­spect and rev­er­ence for the for­mer pres­i­dent and his fam­i­ly, the planned launch of the Roy­al­ty for Every­one pro­gramme that was orig­i­nal­ly sched­uled for Fri­day, has been post­poned to May 14, 2025. —PARA­MARI­BO, Suri­name (CMC)