In Puerto Rico
A repeat of the farce?
Published Jul 4, 2011 9:21 PM
Last April, the U.S. House of Representatives approved HR 2499 RFS,
ironically known as the “Puerto Rico Democracy Act of 2010.” This
allows for a plebiscite on the island, which, in Congress’ own words,
will “provide for a federally sanctioned self-determination process for
the people of Puerto Rico.”
The colony’s representative in the U.S. Congress, Pedro Pierluisi,
who has speaking rights but no voting rights in the House, introduced HR 2499
RFS. Pierluisi is Puerto Rico’s resident commissioner in Washington under
the island’s pro-statehood administration of Gov. Luis Fortuño.
Pierluisi introduced the plebiscite bill on Fortuño’s
behalf.
Adding to the contradictions and falsehoods about colonial status,
Fortuño belongs to the right wing of the Republican Party in the U.S. and
to the New Progressive Party (PNP) on the island. Pierluisi is also from the
PNP, but is a member of the Democratic Party in the U.S.
Many plebiscites and referendums on the status have been conducted in
Puerto Rico, but this is the first time that the island’s government
seeks the formal approval of its master in the empire. This plebiscite, if
approved in the U.S. Senate, will legally authorize Puerto Rico to conduct a
plebiscite. This itself is proof of Puerto Rico’s colonial
status.
Although the pro-independence forces on the island are very clear about
this farce, some doubts remain in the minds of some people. In order to put
those to rest, Puerto Rican patriot and former political prisoner Rafael Cancel
Miranda wrote an open letter on June 21, which is reprinted here.
A repeat of the farce?
Recently a reporter asked me about a so-called plebiscite on the future of
Puerto Rico in which the foreigners [who reside on the island] who swear
citizenship could participate, but not the Puerto Ricans who reside outside
Puerto Rico.
I responded that any plebiscite in the colony would be illegal and fraudulent
because the colonial power and their servile ones control the sociopolitical
and economic life and even the psyche of the Puerto Rican people. And, besides,
to which citizenship do they refer? To which citizenship would a foreigner
swear? The Puerto Rican or the one of the U.S.? We already know which side
those foreigners would be on and why. The United States’ citizenship by
itself constitutes an illegally imposed foreign citizenship in Puerto Rico. On
the other hand, Puerto Ricans, no matter where they are, continue being Puerto
Rican.
In 1952, the government of the United States tried to deceive the world with an
alleged “plebiscite” for the creation of the so-called Free
Associated State. They declared then that by virtue of that
“plebiscite” Puerto Rico had stopped being a colony. Now, almost 60
years later, everybody knows that that was a sham since even committees
appointed by the White House have affirmed that Puerto Rico continues being a
colony, thus confirming what Lolita Lebrón, Andrés Figueroa Cordero,
Irvin Flores Rodriguez and I went to denounce in the Congress in Washington,
D.C., the 1st of March of 1954.
We could extend, but I will not do it. I will simply say that the Yankees did
not have any plebiscite in 1898 in order to invade us. So why would they have
to conduct one in order to leave? It is the same gimmick, with the same words,
to justify before the world the colonialism which they have imposed on us. Many
Puerto Ricans were deceived in 1952. Let us not fall into the same trap.
Besides, the right of the peoples to their independence is not a question of
numbers, and only those who are free can vote freely. There is no power that
can alter that truth.
Articles copyright 1995-2012 Workers World.
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