Crisis in Puerto Rico

The Island of Enchantment has suddenly lost all its enchantment. We can now call it The Island of Desenchantment and Crisis because Puerto Rico is in crisis. We have been living days of anguish since the most dramatic and sad reality with regard to the deficit for the current fiscal year was announced over a week ago. Starting next Monday, May 1st. all the central government agencies will be closed down leaving some 120 million public servers without their salaries during the months of May and June. Why? Because our politicians are hard headed mules that prefer seeing the Island go into crisis instead of doing something to avoid the situation.

This all started back in November 2005 when we had our general elections. We have three principal political parties. After the election the government ended completely divided between two of them. The elected gobernor (executive Branch) belonged to one political party. And the legislature and the Camara belonged to the other political party. Everyone suspected this was going to bring serious problems to the Island. Well, the gobernor says that the budget for the fiscal year ending in June 2006 will be practically in zero at the end of April because there are no funds. That's what he says.

This means that millions of Puerto Ricans who work with the government will be on forced vacations during the months of May and June and will not get paid their salaries. In July lst. the new fiscal year begins and then there is the new budget for the next year. Probably at the end of that new fiscal year the same thing will be true before the end of it.

But, according to the Gobernor, there is no money to pay the public servers now. The money left will be used to pay the only ones that will be working: health , security and other essential government agencies like the police and the hospitals. Even the Board of Education will be closed down leaving all our students with an incomplete education for this school year which ends in May. All schools will be closed down starting on Monday and our students will not have the right to an education which is supposed to be guaranteed by our Constitution. It's a Constitutional right!

And why do I call our politicians hard headed mules. Because since they belong to two different political parties they don't want to agree on anything. The gobernor says that all he needs is for the legislature to approve a loan of $738 million dollars for operational expenses that will guarantee all the workers their salaries during May and June, but the legislature doesn't want to approve it because they belong to another political party and don't want to let the gobernor do anything. They prefer seeing most of the Puerto Ricans without a job because they believe the Gobernor is not saying the truth. The President of the Camera says the crisis doesn't really exist. The gobernor has his hands tied because the legislature doesn't want to approve the loan.

I'm really very worried because the possibility exists that on Monday a lot of people are going to be on strike, there's going to be a lot of rioting and this could mean dangerous situations.

But some people say that the gobernor is using phychological pressure with the people of Puerto Rico trying to scare the hell out of us so that we do something to make the legislators approve the loan. He's telling us to find out the names of our representatives in the government and phone, fax, visit, or e-mail them... and that we should put all our pressure to make them agree to the loan. These people say the gobernor is a liar and that there is money. How do we know who we're going to believe? This is something that had never happened before on this Island. All the legislators have been receiving thousands of phone calls and e-mail messages from our citizens who blame them for the crisis the Island is living. Some, including the Gobernor have received threats.

All this sounds incredible and it never should have happened. But ever since the elections last November our politicians have dedicated their time to fighting between themselves and doing absolutely nothing for the well-being of our people. And they have gotten paid all this time for doing nothing. They have the solution in their hands and they prefer sitting back and ignoring the situation.

All the phychological pressure the Gobernor is putting on our people could just be a strategy to force the Camera of Representatives to approve the loan he is requesting. That's what the President of the Camera of Representatives thinks.

Only God knows what's going to come of all of this crisis.

April 27 2006

4:00 PM