Shift in Cuba Policy Amplifies Puerto Rican Calls for Statehood - The Bradenton Times 11 Jan 2015, 12:30am
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Sunday, January 11th 12:30am
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It’s long been thought that were there to be a 51st state, it would be Puerto Rico, the Caribbean island commonwealth that has had a sometimes complicated status as a U.S. territory dating back to the Spanish-American war. The recent decision by the U.S. to reestablish diplomatic relations with Cuba has some Puerto Rican activists arguing that the same logic suggests statehood for their country.
Officially, Puerto Rico is an an unincorporated territory of the United States, as are Guam, Northern Marianas, theU. S. Virgin Islands and American Samoa (along with 10 uninhabited islands). But its proximity, historic relationship and large population of U.S.-based residents has made for a closer, if somewhat convoluted standing. Puerto Rico elects its own governor and has some level of autonomy, though just like a U.S. state, it cannot decide its own foreign policy.
31 of our states existed as U.S. territories before achieving statehood, most recently Hawaii and Alaska. Others have gone on to achieve sovereignty and become independent countries, like the Federated States of Micronesia, Palau and the Marshall Islands. There’s no sizable movement for independence in Puerto Rico, though it would seem clear that a majority of its citizens would prefer a status other than what they currently hold.
In 2012, the most recent referendum showed that 54 percent of Puerto Ricans wanted to change the status, the majority of whom favored statehood. Recently, two prominent Puerto Rican political voices from different sides of the ideological spectrum used the President’s words regarding the U.S. rationale for reestablishing diplomatic relations with Cuba to argue for the statehood option.
Dr. Ricardo Rosselló, a likely 2016 candidate in Puerto Rico’s gubernatorial election and vice-chairman for the 2008 Hillary Clinton presidential campaign in Puerto Rico, wrote in a letter to President Obama after his Cuba speech that the intent “to leave behind the legacy of both colonization and communism ... to advance the dreams of our citizens,” could just as easily apply to Puerto Rico’s status and end what Rosselló describes as a “condition of political inequality that has been the official U.S. policy on the Island for over 60 years.”
Conservative Puerto Rican political pundit Alfonso Aguilar, who served in multiple roles as part of President George W. Bush's administration, echoed the sentiment, calling the double standard “scandalous.”
The 4 million U.S. citizens in Puerto Rico are not fully protected by the U.S. Constitution. They can serve in the Armed Forces (and have done so at an impressively high ratio), but cannot vote, even though both major political parties include the island in their Presidential Primary process. They also have no representation in Congress, though they are subject to decisions made in Washington.
Statehood could benefit both the U.S. and Puerto Rico, as was the case in Hawaii and Alaska. U.S. income taxes are not currently collected there, nor are corporate taxes. Closing those loopholes would generate revenues while the island would be eligible for federal funding like other states receive – estimated at about $20 billion, though that would be about $2 billion less than the aid it already receives in other forms. Statehood could boost an economy suffering from 13.5 percent unemployment, but Puerto Ricans argue that it's not just the advantages they seek, but also the responsibilities and basic rights.
The most common argument by Puerto Ricans who disfavor statehood is the fear of a loss of culture, a reality that native Hawaiians continue to struggle with more than half a century after being admitted to the union. Puerto Rico's status isn't going to change overnight, as the collective inaction after the 2012 vote has demonstrated. But great political changes often come in waves as part of larger movements. It's uncertain what chain reactions our Cuban shift will ignite; however, a 51st star on the flag may have just become more likely in its wake.
Dennis Maley's column appears every Thursday and Sunday in The Bradenton Times. He can be reached at dennis.maley@thebradentontimes.com. Click here to visit his column archive. Click here to go to his bio page. You can also follow Dennis on Facebook.
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Power, Politics and Journalism in Puerto Rico - CounterPunch 09 Jan 2015, 11:22am
political status of puerto rico - Google News
Friday, January 9th 11:22am
The Universidad del Sagrado Corazón (USC) campus in Santurce, Puerto Rico is a place where the paths of power, politics and journalism converge. One can learn an awful lot about Puerto Rican reality and about why the country is the way that it is just by keeping one’s eyes wide open in this higher learning institution. This private Catholic university has a close working relationship with the powerful Ferré-Rangel clan that is illustrative of how power is wielded in Puerto Rico. USC’s communications school, from where so many of the island’s journalists, advertisers, and public relations and marketing specialists have graduated, is receiving, starting in 2014, $1 million a year for the next five years from GFR Media, part of the family’s corporate empire. Since accepting this grant the school has been renamed Ferré-Rangel Communication School (1).
GFR Media runs three local daily newspapers, including El Nuevo Día, Puerto Rico’s most widely read paper, and 10 business web sites. It is part of Grupo Ferré Rangel, the family’s corporate umbrella.
“The group selectively owns and invests in a value growth portfolio of leading companies that include business development & investments, real estate, media, printing, distribution, marketing solutions and the health industries. The group’s iconic properties include GFR Media… and City View Plaza, a unique Class A real estate development in the heart of San Juan; as well as other group of companies that service telemarketing and distribution.” (2)
Not everyone in the university is impressed with the Ferré-Rangels’ generosity. “This grant [from GFR Media] means that the poorly formed communicators graduated from the school will have to carry the message and editorial line of the Ferré-Rangels and their publications,” said a source in the USC faculty that refused to be identified. This grant “contradicts the institution’s mission, which is to form persons with intellectual liberty, with critical thinking.”
USC and the Ferré-Rangels collaborate in many other initiatives. One of these is Agenda Ciudadana (AC), a roundtable of business and civil society leaders, which “provides a space for trans-sector encounter on public matters that affect the country in the areas of education, the economy, security, health, environment, government structure, human and civil rights, and family life”. It takes credit for the drafting of the so-called Ten Year Plan (Plan Decenal), which seeks to transform public education in Puerto Rico. Other AC partners are Goya, B. Fernández y Hermanos, Microsoft, Bacardí, and the Banco Popular Foundation. Another instance of collaboration is the Press Freedom Center(CLP), a non-governmental organization housed in the USC campus and founded by El Nuevo Día.
According to our confidential source, the university is a stronghold of militant hardcore activists of the right-wing and neoliberal New Progressive Party (PNP), now in the opposition, and of the ultraconservative Catholic group Opus Dei. The USC’s new president is attorney Gilberto Marxuach, who was legal adviser to PNP governor Luis Fortuño (2009-2012). Marxuach was the lead intellectual author of Fortuño’s infamous Law #7, which led to the firing of almost 20,000 public sector employees and facilitated the creation of public-private partnerships, which have turned out to be thinly disguised privatizations (3). USC trustees include Ramón Ruiz-Comas, president of the Triple S health plan, former Bacardí president Angel Torres-Bacardí, and Oriental Bank president José R. Fernández.
“These are the people behind Agenda Ciudadana, and behind the privatizations of the Electric Power Authority and the Education Department with the Plan Decenal for public schools”, said our source.
The Universidad del Sagrado Corazón and US strategy
One of USC’s top scholars is Ramón Daubón, a Puerto Rican economist who seems to play an interesting role in the United States’ geopolitical strategy in Latin America and the Caribbean. Currently coordinator of USC’s master’s program in community development, Daubón was an official of the Ford Foundation in South America from 1990 to 1993, and USAID deputy assistant administrator for Latin America and the Caribbean from 1993 to 1996 (4). USAID is an arm of US foreign policy and has frequently been accused of meddling in the internal affairs of nations it works in, and of being a front for the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). During 2014 USAID was caught red handed in rather clownish schemes to destabilize Cuba, by using social media and by funding hip hop rappers (5). US citizen Alan Gross, arrested in Cuba in 2009 for smuggling satellite broadband equipment and released in December 2014, was at the time of his arrest a subcontractor for USAID (6).
From 2002 to 2008 Daubón was vice-president of the Inter American Foundation, an entity created by the US government to support grassroots community development in Latin America, and has been since 1995 an associate of the Kettering Foundation, which “seeks to identify and address the challenges to making democracy work as it should through interrelated program areas that focus on citizens, communities, and institutions”, according to its web site.
Since 2008 Daubón is president of Esquel Group, which describes itself thus:
“The Esquel Group (EG) is a private non-profit organization founded in 1984 and dedicated to stalwart citizenship as the common element in sustainable democracy and sustainable economic development. It is a member of the Grupo Esquel network with associate entities in Argentina, Brazil, Ecuador, Honduras and Uruguay. Its focus is strongly—though not exclusively—Latin American. It receives its support from contracted work and from donations from private, public and multilateral sources.Through seminars, presentations and training programs EG promotes national policies as well as grassroots initiatives dedicated to social inclusion and sustainable development. It fosters inquiry and action towards self governance and greater citizen engagement in public life, particularly at the local level. EG… conducts training on social entrepreneurship for community development, with particular focus on practices for strengthening the structure and functions of civil society networks, deliberative democracy and conflict management skills.” (7)
Not everyone in Latin America is thrilled with this nonprofit’s activities. An article circulated by Voltaire Net, titled “Esquel: the brain of yankee injustice in Ecuador”, claims that “Esquel is another one of the organizations that receives USAID funding; it leads a justice outfit called ‘National Coalition for Justice’. This would be one of the organizations that intervenes in the election and designation of the country’s magistrates, judges and judicial officials.” (8) An article published in the Ecuadorian newspaper El Telégrafo (June 20 2012) about USAID financing for the political opposition in countries that are members of the left-leaning Bolivarian Alternative of the Americas (ALBA) singles out Esquel as subcontractor or partner in a USAID project in Ecuador called “Strengthening Civil Society in Ecuador”, also known as “Active Citizenry”. (9)
Daubón is on the global advisory board of the Foundation for Puerto Rico. (10) Founded in 2011, this new player in the Puerto Rico power scene “aspires to transform Puerto Rico by driving entrepreneurial engagement and exports, encouraging public sector innovation, unleashing human capital, and fostering social innovation. Our mission is to serve as a catalyst for Puerto Rico’s transformation into a vibrant society and economy by driving entrepreneurship and innovation”, according to its LinkedIn profile (11). Another member of the Foundation’s advisory board is the powerful and influential Kathryn Wylde, president and CEO of the Partnership for New York City (12). Other heavy hitters on the board include executives from Pixelogic, Doral Bank, Viacom and UBS, and two former USC presidents. The Foundation’s directors include Luis Alberto Ferré-Rangel, director of El Nuevo Día, and former Puerto Rico governor and San Juan mayor Sila Calderón.
Daubón is an adviser and scholar at USC’s Institute for Leadership, Empresarismo and Citizenship (ILEC), which according to our confidential source, serves to “facilitates sustained dialogue and through forums and dialogues convince civic, social and community groups of the necessity of embracing change and privatization.”
ILEC is run by Alfredo Carrasquillo, husband of current San Juan mayor Carmen Cruz (of the Popular Democratic Party (PPD)). Carrasquillo is an intellectual leader of theSoberanista tendency within the PPD. He chairs the board of directors of the Soberanista project Somos País, and was a close collaborator of one of the Soberanistamovement’s top leaders, William Miranda-Marín, the late PPD mayor of Caguas.
Carmelo Ruiz-Marrero is a Puerto Rican journalist. http://carmeloruiz.blogspot.com/ On Twitter: @carmeloruiz
Notes.
1 Carmelo Ruiz-Marrero “When Is a Corporate Media Group Too Powerful?” Inter Press Service, November 5 2014. http://www.ipsnews.net/2014/11/when-is-a-corporate-media-group-too-powerful/
2 http://grupoferrerangel.com/about-us/
3 El Nuevo Día, July 6 2011. http://www.elnuevodia.com/renunciademarxuachsecocinabahacemeses-1008991.html
4 Ramón Daubón. LinkedIn profile. https://www.linkedin.com/pub/ramon-e-daubon/8/634/5ab
5 Carmelo Ruiz-Marrero. “The Company that Almost Ruined Cuban Hip Hop is a Profitable Global Operation” Counterpunch, December 29 2014.http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/12/29/the-company-that-almost-ruined-cuban-hip-hop-is-a-profitable-global-operation/
6 Carmelo Ruiz-Marrero. “Who was Alan Gross working for?” Counterpunch, December 22 2014. http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/12/22/who-was-alan-gross-working-for/
7 http://esquel.org/
8 Voltaire Net. “Esquel: el cerebro de la injusticia yanqui en el Ecuador” March 21 2005. http://www.voltairenet.org/article124334.html
9 El Telégrafo (Ecuador) “Usaid admite que financia a la oposición en países de la ALBA” June 20 2012. http://www.telegrafo.com.ec/noticias/informacion-general/item/usaid-admite-que-financia-a-la-oposicion-en-paises-de-la-alba.html
10 http://foundationforpuertorico.org/
11 https://www.linkedin.com/company/foundation-for-puerto-rico
12 Kathryn Wylde profile in Business Week. http://investing.businessweek.com/research/stocks/private/person.asp?personId=162770&privcapId=95085
This article originally appeared on http://alainet.org/.
Puerto Rico's Government And Assorted Agencies Are Running Out Of Money - Seeking Alpha (registration) 26 Jan 2015, 4:37pm
PR Economy News Review
Monday, January 26th 4:37pm
Summary
- Puerto Rico is running out of cash.
- Puerto Rico will likely restructure its debt.
- Bond holders will be hit hard.
Puerto Rico's debt is becoming overwhelming to service. A restructuring appears to be inevitable and this will spell disaster for Mom and Pop investors who own the Commonwealth's bonds.
There are pervasive fears across the municipal bond market that a wide array of Puerto Rico bonds could be restructured in the coming weeks and months. In other words, Puerto Rico is facing widely acknowledged cash flow problems and a financial crisis. It will restructure its current debt levels by renegotiating its distressed debts so it can improve its ability to sell more bonds.
Once Puerto Rico has restructured its debt, the owners of the bonds will likely see their value plummet.
As regular readers of this blog well know, the broad economic backdrop for Puerto Rico is grim and this hurts its bonds. Residents are leaving the island in droves, with Bloomberg reporting a 7% decline in residency since 2005. Principal and interest payments alone consume 15% of the budget.
"Puerto Rico and its agencies are staggering under $73 billion of debt, which would rank the territory third among U.S. states," reported Bloomberg's Michelle Kaske. "The island needs to meet revenue targets and get its economy to grow to enable it to provide services to its 3.5 million residents and also repay investors, said Municipal Market Analytics, Inc.'s Bob Donahue.
"The challenges that are coming down the pike here are greater than they've ever been," said Donahue, managing director of the research firm. There's concern that the commonwealth has to pay short-term bills "at the same time as public-safety responsibilities must be met."
Furthermore, Puerto Rico's Government Development Bank, or GDB, is running out of money, according to a recent Reuters report. The GDB, which finances Puerto Rico's official functions, said last week that liquidity fell to $1.09 billion as of the end of December, compared with $1.55 billion a month earlier.
Another bit of awful news, PREPA, the electric power authority, is working on a plan to restructure $8.6 billion of liabilities this year, a move which would be the "largest restructuring ever in the $3.6 trillion municipal market," according to Bloomberg.
A noted analyst on Puerto Rico at Janney Montgomery Scott, starkly stated that "growing debt and a contracting economy (in Puerto Rico) is an unsustainable condition. It seems very unlikely that PREPA will be the last case of restructuring for Puerto Rico issuers."
Apparently, Puerto Rico's only hope is to raise as much as $2.9 billion in a bond sale this quarter, which would be backed by increasing the petroleum tax revenue. According to Moody's, "residents and business pay about twice as much as mainland consumers for power" so the petroleum tax is not likely to be well received.
So much for the falling oil "tax cut" which mainland U.S. consumers are currently enjoying.
Investment fraud attorneys are already representing a multitude of investors who have suffered large losses in holding UBS closed end funds compromised of Puerto Rico bonds. Any restructuring would likely cause these investments to plummet even further in value.
Puerto Rico is a territory, and therefore, cannot file for bankruptcy. That means restructuring appears to be its only possible solution. The new bond offering would pay as high as 9.5% interest, which is a clear reflection of the enormous risk of these "junk bonds" being peddled to investors. This compares with a return of 0.14 % for a benchmark of one-year municipal bonds.
Investors should be aware of these risks and examine their portfolios to see if they hold any Puerto Rico related debt. If you own a municipal bond mutual fund, for example, call your financial advisor right away to check that it has zero or minimal levels of Puerto Rico bonds. When the restructuring hits, you do not want to be caught on the wrong side of this trade.
Zamansky LLC are securities and investment fraud attorneys representing investors in federal and state litigation against financial institutions.
For more information about Zamansky LLC, please visithttp://www.ubspuertoricofunds.com/.
Disclosure: The author has no positions in any stocks mentioned, and no plans to initiate any positions within the next 72 hours. The author wrote this article themselves, and it expresses their own opinions. The author is not receiving compensation for it. The author has no business relationship with any company whose stock is mentioned in this article. (More...)
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