PASSAGE OF TAKEOVER BILL IN U.S. SENATE Chamber leader: ‘This is a wake-up call’

Saipan Chamber of Commerce president Lynn Knight yesterday said the U.S. Senate’s passage of a federal takeover bill should push the CNMI to work hard in informing American lawmakers about its effects on the island.

Saying that the passage of the takeover bill clearly shows that there are overriding agendas in Washington which pushed the approval of the “immigration takeover bill,” Ms Knight said the business sector will work with elected leaders to educate the members of the U.S. House of Representatives about the need for local control.

“This should be a wake-up call that although we’ve attended hearings and submitted one or two testimonies a year, we simply haven’t done enough to inform American lawmakers of our unique circumstances,” she added.

U.S. Rep. George Radanovich has even encouraged the local people to fight for the Covenant privileges when he visited the CNMI last month. “To me, that’s good advice and we plan to follow it. We’re not perfect and we’ve made mistakes along the way, but we are a moral society that has been working diligently on reforms,” Ms. Knight said.

In her testimony before the U.S. Congress last year, Ms. Knight has warned against the collapse of the CNMI economy in the event of a federalization of labor and immigration.

According to her, the progress which the CNMI has made has not been recognized because it does not fit the agenda to federalize immigration.

“The Chamber has a big job ahead of us to work with our elected leaders on a plan to educate the House about why local control still makes the beset sense for our islands,” she said.

Instead of a federal takeover, Ms. Knight urged that the CNMI law enforcement and federal officials to work together to ensure that the incidence of abuse on the islands will continuously decline.

Due to the effects of the Asia’s economic crisis, the island’s tourism industry plunged 30 percent. Garment manufacturers lost 25 percent of their orders. Automotive sales are down nearly 50 percent just like most in the retail business. One in every 10 businesses has closed, according to officials.

While he Chamber has been working with local government officials to diversify the CNMI economy under the Governor’s Economic Revitalization Task Force, the business group believes that the Northern Marianas would not be able to entice investors to come here in the face of relentless negative campaign launched in Washington.