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NMI Democrats oppose use of MPLT funds to pay CUC debt
The Democratic Party is opposing Gov. Eloy S. Inos’ tentative proposal to take funds from the Marianas Public Land Trust to pay the central government’s debt with the Commonwealth Utilities Corp., saying that MPLT funds are reserved specifically for the direct use of native Northern Marianas descent and not for those who are non-NMDs.
In a statement over the weekend, the party noted that previous and present administrations have continued to fail in their attempts to maintain and rehabilitate the Commonwealth’s power system.
“We have gone through one emergency operations after another for a decade and now the governor wants NMDs to shoulder the weight of paying for the government’s failure when the debt is owed by every voting citizen and business that uses power,” the statement said.
The party believes that the native rights and the funds of NMDs should be respected. “We are sure no one would ask the Native Americans to pay a federal debt. But if the governor applies these funds to a government debt, it will be beyond the obligations of the trust to help locals—a clear violation of the trust’s intentions.”
The Democratic Party statement insists that the central government’s debt with CUC is a debt for the entire CNMI—all its citizens and all businesses—not just the NMDs.
“We saw this same kind of money grabbing behavior with the retirees’ money and now the [Retirement] Fund is broke and dying. The governor’s plan to take money from MPLT really takes away the future funding meant to help NMDs improve their quality of life and the CNMI. MPLT was established to help the native locals, not pay government debt, especially when there is no collateral or credible plan for repayment. We view the governor’s attempt to get money from MPLT as nothing more than a repeat of the same robbery scenarios that killed the Retirement Fund.”
The statement points out that present and previous administration have allowed the CNMI to become a victim of one federal takeover after another: wages, immigration and CW citizenship, the Retirement Fund, and now CUC facing receivership.
“The present administration continues to be a clear and present danger to the local people, with behavior that is more tyrannical than democratic and responsible government. The Democratic Party is offering genuine alternatives and we are confident that voters do not condone what the present administration has done and what they plan to do,” the statement ends. (Saipan Tribune)
