Candle in the wind

In 1978, there was dawning optimism of economic prosperity under a constitutional government. It was the beginning of self-rule on the islands.

Three and-a-half decades later, that bright glow of hope has been snuffed like a candle in the wind. Our government is suffering from persistent bouts with fiscal crisis. The continuing abject misery deepens by the day, drowning the livelihoods of the village folks. The guys and gals on the hill converged in a meeting dubbed “collaboration.” Asked a member of the House, “Collaboration on what?”

The more we probe and dissect our handling of self-rule of recent past, the more it’s clear that we sleepwalked it ignoring citizenship responsibility to actively guide it forward.

Sadly, we can’t blame the deepening fiscal and economic mess on Uncle Sam. We screwed it up ourselves royally too. Even the scapegoats have all gone home!

We partied during the boom years of the ’80s. Then it crashed and flushed out of the floodgates of a highly fragile island economy! Major investments took an exodus. Gone was the fiscal scaffold! We’re caught disoriented, sighing desperately for any answer.

Bankruptcy is now the single narrative throughout the entire landscape. We never saved for that rainy day. The stormy fiscal rainy day is here! We were loose or hardly responsible and accountable in our disposition of scarce fiscal resources. Ready to pay the price of negligence?

Came the federal takeover of immigration. How would the CNMI navigate the requirement to replace CW workers with citizens by 2019? Wouldn’t the integrated casino resort need more than 500 permanent staff workers? It’s a tough cookie to crack given its geopolitical implications.

The issue of leadership comes into play. It’s a missing component, though, in a woefully dizzying equation. It reminds me of the biblical passage where Moses was commanded to lead the Israelites out of Egypt where they were treated as slaves. In our case it’s economic slavery.

The days of using the self-concocted backstop of excuses and the impunity we once had pulling out scapegoats in moments of self-inflicted difficulties are all history. The last I checked there are only the indigenous people standing alone in the open field of familial economic hardship. Optimism has been snuffed like candle in the wind.

Fate of simple villagers

The court has cited the hospital for ignoring an order to pay its utility bills of about $15 million. Understandably, the power generators can’t operate on seawater or persistent bureaucratic excuse. Marching out of court we told the judge, “Esta Lai” or someone goes to visit DOC.

I get goose bumps when I review what’s owed the utility agency: CHC, $15 million; NMI government, $29 million; in addition to budgetary requirements, e.g., CHC, $40 million; PSS, $42 million; Settlement Fund for fiscal year 2016, $29 million; and other agencies and vendors.

The simple folks aren’t necessarily attuned to the deepening fiscal crisis for theirs is found in Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. These are “basic human needs (motivators) that must be satisfied in a strict sequence starting with the lowest level. Physiological needs for survival (to stay alive and reproduce) and security (to feel safe) are the most fundamental and most pressing needs. They are followed by social needs (for love and belonging) and self-esteem needs (to feel worthy, respected, and have status). The final and highest level needs is self-actualization needs (self-fulfillment and achievement). Its underlying theme is that human beings are “wanting” beings: as they satisfy one need the next emerges on its own and demands satisfaction and so on until the need for self-actualization that, by its very nature, cannot be fully satisfied and thus does not generate more needs.

It’s an interesting reaction where they’d lend an ear momentarily then quickly return to working on actual survival. One related that he challenges people on the hill to deliver their promise of better days ahead. “As it is, the consistent and persistent slide of fiscal resources is a tale of what lies ahead which isn’t very promising.”

Can the deepening mess be salvaged? Definitely! Deficit spending becomes a tool of necessity to navigate the bad times in hopes of soft landing soon on real time economic growth. But this would require leadership and a set of genuine plans. There’s none!

The reality of the pension program is simple: The Fund’s unfunded liability is around $779 million and needs some $30 million to pay retirees in fiscal 2016 under the Settlement Fund. By 2019, if not earlier, it would go bankrupt or broke. Politicians of recent past have robbed the program of its fiscal integrity singing “Don’t worry, be happy…” Retirees aren’t singing but worried sick what happens when the checks stop coming. You’re talking of 9,000-plus simple villagers.