Noticel reports that Puerto Rico’s House Speaker Carlos “Johnny” Méndez sees a simple explanation for the firing of five members of the PROMESA Fiscal Oversight and Management Board: the colonial relationship between the United States and Puerto Rico.
“The news that, allegedly by order of the White House, five of the seven members of the Oversight Board will be replaced without consulting the people of Puerto Rico or their freely and democratically elected officials is the most blatant example of how we live under a colonial regime, where we lack the political power to make our own decisions,” said Mendez. “This action also demonstrates that there was never a pact between Puerto Rico and the United States in 1952, as defenders of the colony have tried to claim for decades.”
What pact?
For decades, leaders of Puerto Rico’s “commonwealth” party claimed that there was a compact between the federal government and Puerto Rico which could only be changed by mutual agreement, and which created a unique special relationship between the territory and the United States. This was never the case. When Puerto Rico changed its official name to the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico in 1952, all official documents from the federal government clearly stated that this change did not affect the political status of Puerto Rico.
What colony?
Puerto Rico is a territory of the United States, just as nearly three dozen of the current states used to be. However, Puerto Rico is an unincorporated territory, a strange idea which says that the U.S. Constitution does not fully apply in Puerto Rico (but doesn’t say exactly which parts do and do not apply) and also says that Puerto Rico can remain a territory indefinitely, with no requirement that Congress admit us as a state.
The current political status of Puerto Rico, realistically, is a colonial one. No state could have had an oversight board imposed upon it and no state can have its elected officials overruled by an oversight board. That is the nature of the current relationship between Puerto Rico and the United States. Continuing as a territory continues this relationship, as Méndez pointed out when he criticized “those who seek to maintain the status quo, the colony, which allows Congress or the President of the United States to impose on us people who control our destinies without any interference from the People or their elected officials.”
Defending the colony
“We live in a colony, and the people who seek to ensure that we continue living under this immoral political condition only do so out of personal aspirations; they don’t want the best for Puerto Rico,” Méndez concluded. “The imposition of the Fiscal Oversight Board under the PROMESA Act in 2016 exposed the lack of true autonomy. Puerto Rico does not control its finances, and many of its political decisions are subordinated to an entity imposed by Washington. Today’s actions expose this reality once again. There is no way to defend the colony.”
The future of the oversight board is uncertain, but it is certain that Puerto Rico would be better off as a state. Reach out to your representatives and let them know that you support statehood and you want to see them do the same.
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