Antonio R. Cabrera, who served in the Froilan C. Tenorio administration from Sept. 1995 to Aug. 1997, said the governor is facing a lot of problems, but appears not to know which direction to take.
This is compounded by the lack of enforcement in the collection of taxes and the government’s failure to audit private businesses.
Speaking as a businessman, Cabrera said he is not sure where the government is headed because “it has never been consistent with its policies.”
“There was one administration that was pro-business then it was followed by anti-business administration,” he said.
The main problem of the Fitial administration, he added, is how to attract major investors.
The closure of many garment factories has greatly affected government revenues, but the administration apparently has no plan to bring in another industry, Cabrera said.
The CNMI could have resorted to software production considering the availability of workforce from the Philippines and other Asian countries, he added.
According to Cabrera, the government must have a plan to attract other industries “so that even the U.S. Congress would say that we are going in the right direction.”
“We never planned how we’re going to replace a departing industry with another,” he said.
The tourism industry is also not doing well, he added, because the Marianas Visitors Authority “doesn’t even know what it wants to do.”
He said MVA is promoting Saipan as a family destination while allowing massage parlors and other adult establishments to do business in Garapan, where several hotels are located.
“Zoning is too late,” he added.
Cabrera said the governor has to “set up a think-tank, cross party lines and bring in the best and the brightest.”
He added, “If the governor could jump-start the economy within his remaining 18 months in office it would be his legacy. We need to sit down now to start planning how to correct this problem. We need other groups. We need to get people from different political parties and set aside politics.”
