By Zaldy Dandan
Variety Editor

THE chairman of the chamber of commerce claims that the CNMI has a “unified” position against the federalization of local minimum wage and immigration. He says “the only one who is not unified with us is the Washington rep.”
Who is the “CNMI”? According to the chamber chairman, “the chamber, the [Fitial] administration, the Legislature.”
But does the chamber really speak for the CNMI, let alone the local business community? Who are the chamber members and how many of them are active? Who elected them to speak for the CNMI? The governor, for his part, wasn’t elected by almost 75 percent of the electorate (he didn’t even win on Saipan; Heinz did), and there are lawmakers who agree with the position of the Wash. rep. — who was elected by a clear majority of CNMI voters to speak for them in their nation’s capital.
Pete A., as those who have no selective amnesia know, was on the NMI commission that negotiated the drafting of the Covenant. As a two-term lt. governor, he headed the CNMI 902 panel. Since 2002, he has been in Washington, D.C., in close consultation with the White House and members of Congress as well as their staffers regarding CNMI matters.
The chamber chairman and this administration should be the last persons to question the Wash. rep.’s right to speak about these issues.
Pete A. knows what he is talking about and his position on federalization makes sense in contrast with the “no to federalization now, no to federalization forever!” stance of the administration and the chamber.
In his position paper submitted to the U.S. Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, the governor noted that the model bill the panel is working on was drafted almost a decade ago. He then proceeded to defend continued local control by rehashing the rhetoric of those in the CNMI who opposed the Murkowski bill years ago.
Local control, says the governor, is vital to the local economy. Governor, sir, what local economy are you talking about? The one that has been in a freefall since 1998 despite a $3.05 wage rate and an immigration system that was once compared to the Mafia?
He also says that the CNMI wants to “remain self-reliant”…without acknowledging the local government’s federal bailout request last year and its ever deepening dependence on federal dole-outs for public health, public education, public safety and other vital services that the CNMI’s self-reliant government is supposed to provide the local people.
Stagnant wages and a sieve-like immigration system, moreover, will not save the administration and the chamber’s beloved garment industry. U.S. consumers, like sane consumers elsewhere, will always prefer cheaper apparel, which the local garment factories cannot produce if they’re competing against Third World manufacturers.
And what exactly can the CNMI government show for its coddling of the garment industry since the 1980s? Damage to the environment, a huge local unemployment rate, a big and bankrupt government, and a tarnished image in Washington and any place in the world where the people can Google-search “sweatshops” and “Jack Abramoff.”
What we have is a failed status quo and this is what the reactionaries among big business and their chums in the CNMI government are defending.
The people, in contrast, want change. They know that if these issues are not resolved there will be no new and legitimate investors coming in, and no new job opportunities for locals. What we’ll have is more of what we have right now, which is getting worse and can no longer be endured.
The CNMI has to end this uncertainty over federalization issues once and for all. It cannot attract solid investors if the commonwealth’s labor and immigration laws remain hostage to the political situation in Washington, D.C. The CNMI has to move forward, and Pete A.’s middle-ground position should be pursued. He favors a gradual wage hike that will take into consideration local economic conditions, and federal immigration rules that will allow the CNMI to have a tourist-visa waiver program and hire the foreign workers it needs while ensuring “indigenous population protection from social and political alienation from immigrants.” (Read: A stay-limit and no green cards for alien workers.)
Pete A. offers a way out of the CNMI’s deepening crisis. The governor and the chamber want more of the same.

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