Political Sorruption in Puerto Rico: Struggle for Identity and Independence

Political corruption is the practice of the usage of the powers given to government officials or their network contacts for illegitimate individual benefit. Corruption is characterized by extortion, nepotism, bribery, cronyism, parochialism, patronage, graft, peddling, and embezzlement. The danger of corruption is the enabling of criminal initiatives like drug dealing, concealing the source of money because of criminal activity, and worse of all, human trafficking. In simpler words, corruption is the presentation of government political officials that have done an action that is unethical or has been planned on a devious way or with an illegal intent. The effect that corruption has on politics is what this research paper will incline to. Corruption in a political view diminishes the power of democracy and good administration by ignoring or even disrupting official processes. Political corruption involves distortion in elections and legislature decreased of liability and misshaping the representation of policymaking. It also comes with the theme of government transparency which means the obligation of a government to disclose publicly all information with the citizens when it is required to make knowledgeable decisions and hold officials accountable for the behavior of the people’s business. Despite how much laws and how much advocation to pro-transparency requests from the people and journalists are commonly ignored and no one even knows what is happening inside the government. The government has a duty on sharing certain information, in a well-timed manner by changing the burden and anxiety from citizens to the sate so that could officially be held accountable. Corruption in politics is frequent in modern countries that lack effective political parties because corruption varies contrariwise with political organization. Corruption is motivated by the strong reliance of the government’s interference in economic aspects or the extreme bureaucratic join. Leaving a problem which is the danger of having corruption eventually beginning to weaken the conditions of what it really means, due to the contribution of individual growth of benefits and solidifying individual or private institutions.

This problem has captured the attention of experts because it is a practice that has originated from ancient civil societies to the complexities of administrations of the present day. The essence and associations of corruption have changed significantly in our society in comparison to past times. In ancient societies that did not practice democracy but had some fundamentals of it demonstrated that there power only was underlined by lineage, this meaning that the definition of corruption in earlier eras was not noticeable because every action that the king or higher power took was considered to be lawful and rightful. Corruption exists in all social and political systems like feudalism, capitalism, communism, and socialism and it affects all class societies and state institutions. The major risk that corruption does is on the developing countries because of how the government let himself get brainwashed by power and money-making this not have a political order or trust with the people. An illegal act by a government official forms political corruption when the action is directly related on the abuse of their official duties, involving trading in influence. The actions taken for it being corruption are different in every country because of its own jurisdiction, like political funding. This is why it is such a sensitive topic because corruption can be taken in many ways. For example, a state uncontrolled political corruption is called a kleptocracy meaning “rule by thieves”. Bribery, let alone compromising one trillion US dollars annually, is now known as “institutional corruption” that distinguishes itself from bribery to other forms of personal interest of gain. One situation in which corruption occurs is when an institution or a country needs to depend on financial support from another institution, country, or people that interests don’t necessarily are equal to those that there are supporting, and they conflict with their purpose.

With this type of problem being said, Puerto Rico is one of the best examples of corruption led by another institution. In 2019 summer, Puerto Rico was outraged when finding out about the corruption that was embedded in our government. Ricardo Roselló, ex-governor of Puerto Rico had taken $15.5 million dollars in contracts to restore the island after Maria, and the employees’ use of private contact networks to handle public business. And also, the leaked group chat of 889 pages with his close associates uncovers his character and his offensive words that surpasses the worse type of vulgarity. However, the corruption goes way back, it did not start in July summer of 2019. The administration of Roselló had serious allegations of how they were mismanaging the country when Hurricane Maria destroyed the island. When the 889 pages of the group chat were leaked, the people were infuriated. Ricardo Roselló would adders the female administrators of his office like “whores” and he would despise the LGBTQ community and saying homophobic comments to a sponsor and donor and most importantly someone who has brought the island power and recognition, Ricky Martin. Another thing that astonished the federal board was his comment saying “ Dear Oversight Board, Go F--- Yourself” with Puerto Rico’s financial crisis. This group message that contained 11 members of his Cabinet were leaked by Puerto Rico’s Center for Investigate Journalism. The citizens in Puerto Rico have been nothing more than patient throughout the decades because of their sense of nationality and patriotism, however, it is a burden to think about the incompetence and corruption that they have to fight every day. 

Puerto Rico’s bankruptcy, the economic recession, and especially the worse of all Hurricane Maria, have left Puerto Ricans with nothing more than anger and wanting for a change. Earlier in the month of August, the FBI arrested five formal cabinet officials and contractors that were handling the $15.5 million dollars in the post-Maria contracts. Also, Education Secretary Julia Keleher and Ángela Ávila-Marrero (chief of Puerto Rico’s Health Insurance Administration) were accused on taking the government's contracts to personal businesses. All the corruption allegations were being shared to the public, so it triggered the largest protest to make Ricardo Roselló resign on the history of Puerto Rico. Puerto Rico is suffering from an unemployment rate of 7.7% which is double the national rate of the US and 45% of Puerto Ricans live in poverty. However, like stated above, Puerto Rico was in a bad shape before the creation of tax breaks for the investment in Puerto Rico, which drove the island to debt. Also, how US Congress made it so difficult and expensive to live or do business in the island. The result of the Merchant Marine Act of 1920, known as the Jones Act, leaves Puerto Rico with their hands tied by requiring companies to only use US chipping crews to transport products between US ports and not letting them hire other teams that benefit the island better with other deals. This law makes it extremely difficult for Puerto Rico to buy goods to import. Later, on 1996 US Congress began to remove the tax-incentive program so that Puerto Rico could have high investment but let US companies leave and take potential jobs for Puerto Ricans. This promoted with the Great Recession, crumpled the territory’s tax base and led the government to have a bigger debt.

Being a Puerto Rican, I personally feel ashamed with everything that has happened. My culture has a really strong passion for my island, and nothing will ever change that; yet when you listen and you see the seriousness and how bad it actually is, it's heartbreaking. Never in a million years, I have seen my island look unrecognizable after Hurricane Maria, never I have seen my family cry over how the beaches and the nature of the island were left. Even with that, everyone stood up and would keep fighting. But the worst was yet to come, the scandal of our governor, the one that was supposed to have the most pride of our island, was ashamed to be Puerto Rican. When we saw all of this, we needed to do something. Tens of thousands of Puerto Ricans went to the streets to demand for Roselló’s resignation, and luckily, I experienced it. We marchers, went to “Calle la Fortaleza” which is at Old San Juan where the governors live and started with a peaceful protest. 

However, the governor still would not take us seriously and would publicly say that he will not resign. This infuriated the people even more because it was like if he was not taking the people seriously. There were around six marches in the span of two weeks, I went to the biggest one which was to walk all of Old San Juan and the final destination was to go to the governor’s house street. This march had a lot of publicity due to a lot of celebrities advocating to go. I went with my family and I remember that we had a whole day of preparation the day before. Since it was shown in the news that the riots became more violent due to impatience of the police. We had to prepare for attacks like tear gas, pepper spray or just the police batons; we brought with us backpacks filled with water bottles, towels, changes of clothes, and masks to cover our faces and mouths. I remember when we first arrived and immediately you could feel the air filled with enthusiasm, and just a big sense of love for Puerto Rico. The streets were filled with thousands of people, lifting up our flags and signing the anthem and local music. Every hour the celebrities that were directing the march would the people stop to take a break of walking and say a speech. Every time we stopped, we sang different patriotic songs, and every time I would cry because you could feel the energy of everyone and the union of the country. As we start arriving to the governor’s house, we can smell chemicals and we see more police officers, the mood of the crowd started getting serious and heavy. When we arrived, it was really difficult to breathe or move because everyone was in this confined street and there were five rows of police officers that would take up more space and the smell would get even worse. What the people would do was stand in front of the police officers and talk and say rhymes of how bad the situation is. Every time someone talked or sang, all I could feel was goosebumps. 

The people were getting impatient because it was the fourth day, the police officers were more aggressive and still there was no statement from the governor. I remember seeing a family passing in front of the police officers; it was a couple with a child and a teenager, they were trying to escape and leave the scene, so they cut in front of one of the police officers and I remember seeing the child scream and cry because it saw that the police pushed his dad because the was too close to the fence. This really got me mad because it is just a family who was clearly trying to leave and specially doing that in front of a child, for me was unacceptable. As the night continued, the crowd started to get more and more violent. I remember my dad grabbing us and saying, “is time to leave”. They were a lot of rumors saying that one of the biggest drug dealers of the island was going to arrive with more than 5,000 bikers and try to get as far into the governor’s house. This drug dealer is really known in the island and respected, so we know that it was going to get more dangerous and it could possibly end up in a shooting or something violent. My dad wanted to take us out of there as fast as possible, but since there was so many people and it was so crowded, it was nearly impossible to move. When we finally did it, we listen to the bikers approaching and I just remember being really scared and just start running because we could hear the guns going off to the air. When we finally got the car and felt secure, I could listen to my mom still getting over the scare of the riot and calming her down. Unfortunately, I couldn’t stay for the other marches because I had a flight to catch, but we were really on edge of leaving our families at home because the whole island was rebelling, and Puerto Rico gets really dangerous. We were also really anxious because they were rumors saying that the governor would finally say a statement of his resignation. Finally, on August 2, there was an announced statement of the governors of the news and that he would make a video at 8:00 pm of his resignation. We all waited to 8:00 pm, and when the moment came, we just gathered around waiting for the final announcement. When he did, everyone back home started calling and everyone was feasting and going out to the streets to celebrate the victory that the people accomplished. I remember seeing my parents cry because it was their first time experiencing something like that and seeing how patriotic they have made me really proud of my island. Even though it was a really bad the circumstances that brought the island together, we still managed to find our love for our country and remind ourselves that the people are actually the ones that make the decision, not the government.

This leads me to the sense of American colonialism and its effect in Puerto Rico. Puerto Rico is a territory form the United States that has the right of having a US citizenship. The island was purchased as a U.S. colony in 1898 because of the Treaty of Paris. Puerto Rico had the right to choose whether if they wanted to be colonized by the United States, but that decision was not granted as an option for the islanders. This means that the United States did not care and could lead to the fact that Puerto Rico had no saying to choose for further formal decisions. According to the article on the Washington Post, “Puerto Ricans are hardly U.S. citizens They are colonial subjects” states that after the hurricane Puerto Ricans were treated not like citizens of the United States, just as colonial subjects. It also states how it will be really hard to change the mind of the Congress of Puerto Rico and their self-determination to free themselves. This makes me really frustrated to see because being born and raised in Puerto Rico, and now living in the United States I can see how we are not considered at all or even acknowledge by Unite States citizens. From personal experience, I have encountered the ignorance of how Puerto Rico is not really known or considered to be somewhat part of the United States and we have the citizenship. Also, it does not help how Trump diminishes the island and how badly he talks about the administration yet does not do anything to make it a priority to help the poverty rate that keeps on increasing. However, I guess that it can go both ways because by experiencing the riots first handed, one can clearly feel the sense of devotion to help the country. 

The island political status can split into 50% and 50% percent of either wanting to become a state or wanting to be affiliated to the US, but self-governed. I advocate that we have a sense of patriotism rather than nationalism. Nationalism is the identification of one’s own nation, which is what Puerto Ricans feel, but we don’t necessarily exclude the interests of other nations. Rather we advocate for the support of the country, and integrity, which is patriotism. This is why this summer of 2019, the people went to the streets and fought for their rights and were victorious by kicking the governor out from its power because he does not represent them as a whole. Puerto Rican history is really complicated and difficult to understand because there are so many things going on at the same time and it looks like it is confusing to understand who has the power to make correct decisions for the better of the country. Corruption in Puerto Rico unluckily is ingrained in every aspect of the government. Since we were colonized by the U.S., we did not have a choose on what we wanted to do, we were just bought and started working for the United States' profit and benefit. Even had to experience and suffer the United States experiment of birth control to women without them not even knowing what was happening to them, which is unethical behavior and a type of corruption of the US not being transparent to Puerto Rican women. Besides this point, it is clear if one sees the history of Puerto Rico, how much corruption has been lingering around with no help to try and eliminated for good to better the island's lifestyle. And is much clearer how all of this shows the strength of Puerto Rico, and how now people are finally opening up their eyes to really understand what is going on and to stand by and fight for the rights that we deserve. Something really satisfying is how, yes it has taken time, and yes maybe one can feel that there is no other option of bettering the country, but, the union of the island and the people overcomes every obstacle thrown. Everyone has always one goal, which is the better good for the country and to make us known. The sense of pride that a Puerto Rican has for its culture and history is undoubtedly admiring. This leaves me with the perception that even though we have U.S. citizenship, nothing could ever take away our culture and how high up we look at our beautiful island.