SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico — For decades the U.S. government claimed that Puerto Rico was a “showcase for democracy” and a demonstration of the superiority of capitalist development.
Today, almost every citizen of the “island of enchantment” knows the truth — Puerto Rico is a U.S. colony. U.S. corporations exploit the natural resources and cheap labor to boost their profits. And the people of Puerto Rico have no say in the laws or economic priorities the U.S. rulers force on them.
When the Barack Obama presidency and Republicans joined together in 2016 to impose the Fiscal Oversight and Management Board for Puerto Rico, some workers hoped it would clean up corruption and improve public services. It didn’t take long before they learned that the only purpose of the Junta, as the board is known here, is to squeeze working people in order to pay off the $17 billion in debt contracted by the colonial government, and to keep filling the coffers of wealthy bondholders.
Ten years later the unelected Junta still has veto power over the colonial government’s financial decisions. It ordered the government to privatize the electrical system and forced through pension cuts. Even a decision to reactivate five wells to combat periodic water shortages can’t be implemented without the Junta’s approval.
“I thought the Junta would at least clean up corruption,” 38-year-old teacher’s aide María Soto said when she met Militant correspondents visiting San Juan’s Barrio Venezuela Sept. 26. “But they turned out to be just as bad as the government.”
“It’s not our fault the government took out loans,” said her friend, Brenda Rivera, a government worker who lives in Trujillo Alto. “Why should we have to pay the bondholders?”
“I haven’t had a wage raise in 15 years,” she noted. She makes $1,700 a month, but rent is $750, her electric bill is over $100, water costs $150 and health insurance is $300 a month.
The government doesn’t care about the “middle class and the poor,” she said. Like in the United States, Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents have stepped up their arrest and deportation of immigrant workers, especially Dominicans. “They’re not criminals. They’re just trying to feed their families like everybody else,” Rivera said.
Daily brownouts
Puerto Rico’s antiquated electrical grid was decimated by Hurricanes Maria and Irma in 2017. In 2021 the grid was put in the hands of Luma, a U.S.-Canadian joint venture, after the Junta ordered it privatized. “It was better when it was a public utility,” Soto said. “Now there are blackouts twice a week and brownouts almost every day.” Brownouts, with their low and fluctuating voltages, can severely damage appliances.
“But when you complain to Luma they say it’s not their problem,” Soto said.
Soto was one of hundreds of thousands who joined protests in 2019 that forced Gov. Ricardo Roselló to resign, after years of worsening conditions for working people, officials’ negligence in the face of hurricanes, and outrage over government corruption. Roselló belonged to the pro-statehood New Progressive Party.
“What good did it do?” Soto asked. “We got rid of Ricky and got Jenniffer González,” from the same party. In her view the other main bourgeois party, the Popular Democratic Party, is no better.
Militant correspondents met construction worker Marino Hernández and government worker Melissa López. They were running a small food stand and grill. “Even though we work full time and our 19-year-old daughter works, it’s not enough,” López said. “So we put up this stand on weekends.”
Hernández supports the Popular Democratic Party and blames the statehood party for the electrical blackouts and water shortages. But even though his party is for maintaining Puerto Rico’s subordinate status to Washington, he is for independence. “We’re not ready for independence yet,” he said. “But we have to get ready.”
Earlier this year a drought and the deteriorated water system left hundreds of thousands of homes without running water. Some 65% of the water leaks out of the antiquated system. But the government has no plan for replacing this infrastructure.
José Cajigas, president of the Independent Authentic Union of Workers at Puerto Rico’s water department, told the press the biggest problem is that “years ago there were nearly 5,000 workers, today there are just 2,800.” New hires quit because they are “overworked, disrespected [by bosses] and underpaid.”
The union held a one-day strike Aug. 18 to demand a raise. On Sept. 27 the water department finally agreed to raise the base pay from $10.50 an hour to $12. But even that small raise — after 15 years with no increase — must be approved by the Junta.