Flowers for Obama in Puerto Rico?

Nervous, the annexationist governor Luis Fortuño almost begged Puerto Ricans not to protest. “If you wish to protest against me on this occasion, go ahead,” he conceded, “but we are taking advantage of President Obama’s visit to celebrate who we are.”

The Democratic president will only be on the island for a few hours today. However, this visit is historical because he will break the ice of 50 years since John F. Kennedy made the last official presidential visit.

It is not the event, however, that will be engraved in history, given the rapid and carefully guarded steps being undertaken right now as the president is being taken around the Puerto Rican capital. He is following a secret travel itinerary, a precaution taken by security forces. Those who see the trip positively think that the head of state has chosen the ideal moment. Almost three months ago, the so-called White House Interagency Working Group on Puerto Rico, created by Bill Clinton in 2000 and extended by Obama, recommended asking Puerto Ricans about their status so that they can “decide” the future of the nation. According to reports, an initial referendum would pose the question to the island’s residents of whether they want continue under the euphemism “Commonwealth” (called Estado Libre Asociado, ELA in Spanish) that has kept them as a neo-colony of the United States since 1952. If the response were negative, it would pronounce whether they wish to be another star on the American flag, or if they would prefer independence.

Some estimate that such suggestions are enough for Puerto Ricans to welcome Obama with flowers, under these and other initiatives reflected in the conclusions of the body of the report. Nevertheless, some issues remain undefined. On one hand, there are no indicators that the eventual double plebiscite would have the binding character to obligate Washington to implement the results. And, on the other, it says that if the voters prefer to be independent, the other option would be to maintain the U.S. citizenship that impedes them from having Puerto Rican citizenship today.

What’s most important, however, is that everything is still pure speculation. The U.S. Congress has still not decided whether the idea will be implemented. Furthermore, what should be weighed and enforced is the twenty-nine times that the United Nation’s Committee on Decolonization pronounced in favor of Puerto Rico’s self determination, in correspondence with international law.

Thus, the “offers” that Obama has been trying to propose have not succeeded in clouding everyone’s mind. There are many Puerto Ricans that think there is nothing to be thankful for, even though the governor and his minions have arranged a way to raise funds for his re-election campaign that adds up to a modest $35,000.

Those who believe the moment for the visit is appropriate may be mistaken as Puerto Ricans come from days of intense protest. First, against the neoliberal model dictated from the North, imposed by the governor, and brought to fruition by more than 12,000 public servants without jobs thanks to the so-called Law 7. And more recently, we were witnesses to inspirational protests by university students. They continue to reject the enormous increase in the registration fee to $800 for University of Puerto Rico, the only public university in Puerto Rico. The support that other social sectors gave to the youths again brought up the sense of nationhood that, precisely, Washington has wanted to defeat among the Puerto Ricans.

That would be enough to understand the plea of Fortuño when parties, independence and leftist organizations, human rights agencies, including environmental groups, announced their repudiation of heightened fees. Perhaps the elite forces that previously breached the university campus and massacred students on strike, would as fiercely repress those that dare to protest today?

Despite its public good wishes for the island, the same offered to Latin America in the Port of Spain Summit that still haven’t come true, many maintain that Obama only went to San Juan to court the vote of Boricuas that live in the Union. They are the only Puerto Ricans to who the United States concedes the right to vote in presidential elections. That is how Washington treats its “free associates”.