“A LEADER lying to himself is a weakness of character but lying to your citizen to cover up for vices is punishable by removal from office.” — from an unknown author.
“I have nothing to hide and done nothing wrong.” Who do you think made this dishonest statement publicly and repeatedly? You guessed it right, no other than the despicable and deceitful corrupted Gov. Ralph Torres. I was debating whether to continue calling him Governor or not because he has dishonored his title and defamed the office of the people he occupies. I do not think he deserves the prestige nor the gloriousness of the title. But out of respect for the institution he was elected to, I resigned from my own personal feeling.
Governor Torres continued to claim he has “done nothing wrong,” but when subpoenaed to appear before the JGO committee to explain publicly his travel expenditures, reimbursement claims, misused of government resources, abuse of authority and other sordid financial scams, instead of appearing as he was publicly pleading for, he connivingly filed a lawsuit. Isn’t this the height of hypocrisy?
Governor Torres who solemnly swear to support and defend the constitution and laws of the Commonwealth and that he will faithfully discharge his duties as Governor, violated repeatedly his own oath of office. Shameful, vile, or corrupt character or acts is a crime of moral turpitude and a disqualifying attribute to hold public office. This Governor appeared to have an incurable issue dealing with honesty and trustworthiness. And any time a public official lies and mislead his own people, he undermines his own authority and squandered the public trust and must be held completely and personally accountable.
Governor Torres is not on criminal trial in a court of law, where the presumption of innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt applies. Conversely, political investigations, through a legislative body, for corruption, unethical conducts and abuse of authority while in office, only preponderance of evidence base on morally and ethically suspect and questionable decisions and actions suffices. So, by his failure and refusal to explain clearly to the public his fraudulence acts, documents bearing his own signatures speaks truth to his crime.
Governor Torres used KKMP, a radio station he paid thousands of dollars to regularly spew out his self-serving diatribes, including his bold public pronouncements that he has “nothing to hide.” Well Mr. Governor, if you have “nothing to hide,” why are you complicitly allowing your subpoenaed staff to frustrate the work of the JGO committee and preventing the truth from being told. A constitutionally established legislative function investigating your unethical conduct is not an illegitimate duty as you were trying to falsely portray. The legislative power to investigate those entrusted with the public enterprises, is a great public trust.
Did Governor Torres, through action or inaction, corruptly seek to obstruct or impede the legislative official function in investigating his malfeasances in office? It appeared this was the case because if he has “nothing to hide and done nothing wrong,” as he egotistically continues to claim, why would he be raising up legal arguments that seemed to be taken out of the playbook of the disgraced and twice impeached Donald Trump. How fundamentally significant is the public interest in his wasteful legal arguments? Whose interest was it that must be protected? And was his political interest more paramountcy superior over the constitutional interest of citizens?
Wasting public funds to hire expensive lawyers to represent him, raises serious question of personal integrity. Being truthful and honest to your citizens does not require hiring expensive legal representation. After all, Governor Torres has a solemn duty to protect and defend the constitution and laws of the Commonwealth. Lawyering up and surrounding yourself with expensive legal defense: only guilty individuals revert to such kind of protection which, in my opinion, is tantamount to consciousness of guilt.
Governor Torres’s amoral attitude to ethical behavior is so repulsively dishonest that he deserves to be impeach and removed from office. Lying purposefully deliberately with malice aforethought and intent to deceive by manipulating the system to give advantage to a self-serving interest is not only impeachable but dreadfully indefensible.
The arrogance of deception by this Governor and his hypocrisy is clearly coming out openly for us to bear. We the public should not allow ourselves to be taken as fools to forgive his atrocious misdeeds. His contemptable act of deception is immorally and ethically reprehensible. Trust in our democratic system of governance is an indelible institutional characteristic that must be defended and anyone who is plotting to weaken its forces must be forever considered a TRAITOR to the public trust and consequently the verdict of his misdeeds shall be GUILTY as charged!
DANIEL O. QUITUGUA
Kanat Tabla, Saipan.
Daniel O. Quitugua
