By John McPhaul
Rep. José “Conny” Varela Fernández, the deputy speaker of the island House of Representatives, demanded on Tuesday that Gov. Pedro Pierluisi Urrutia explain with what funds a proposed status plebiscite will be conducted along with the general elections on Nov. 5.
“The State Elections Commission [SEC] has been complaining for quite some time that it does not have enough funds to hire the staff and equipment needed to conduct the general election. The June 2 primaries showed that more machines, more personnel and more evidence are needed for the process mandated by law to be reliable and successful,” Varela said in a written statement.
The governor announced on Monday afternoon that he would be calling the so-called “criollo plebiscite,” in which voters would choose between statehood, independence and independence through free association, without the endorsement of the island Legislature, as allowed by Law 165-2020. Varela questioned the legality and financial viability of the proposed plebiscite, noting that the SEC faces a significant deficit.
The lawmaker said none of the previous plebiscites promoted by the governor’s pro-statehood New Progressive Party (NPP) have had an effect on statehood claims, and that the new plebiscite would cost no less than $600,000 in ballots alone, not counting additional expenses.
“Where is this money going to come from?” Varela said. “That is the question that the outgoing governor has to answer.”
He said that at the direction of Popular Democratic Party (PDP) President Jesús Manuel Ortiz González, the governing board of the pro-commonwealth party would meet today “to discuss our institutional position on this futile exercise.”
Ortiz González said in a statement Monday night that “once again an NPP governor is calling for an inconsequential plebiscite to be held on the same day as the general elections.”
“This action constitutes another exercise that only aims to divert attention from the bad governments of the NPP to try to get their forces out to the polls,” said Ortiz González, who is the PDP candidate for governor.
On Tuesday the PDP president said the most obvious choice is to promote a boycott of the process, but he did not dismiss going to court to challenge it.
Other island political parties let their opposition to the latest proposed status referendum be known after it was announced, among them the Puerto Rican Independence Party (PIP), which in the past has backed the holding of similar plebiscites.
Veteran NPP Rep. José Aponte Hernández said the PIP’s newfound position against the holding of a status consultation is centered on PIP gubernatorial candidate Juan Dalmau Ramírez’s fear of defending independence in the face of the reality that the vast majority of the people have rejected that alternative.
“The PIP has historically supported this type of consultation because until the other day, that party openly promoted independence for Puerto Rico,” Aponte said. “Now, with the sole purpose of trying to find more voters, the PIP under Juan Dalmau is trying to deceive the electorate because not only does it avoid talking about independence, but now it does not want to participate in the status consultation with decolonizing options, an exercise they have participated in previously. It is obvious that this is an attempt by Dalmau not to have to talk about independence because that way he loses thousands of votes.”
The Citizen Victory Movement (MVC by its initials in Spanish) echoed the PDP in registering its rejection of the proposed plebiscite, calling it another deception by the NPP designed to attract votes to its “failed project.”
“Again the crooked priorities of those who administer the country,” MVC Electoral Commissioner Lillian Aponte Dones said in a written statement. “In the deepest moments of the democratic and fiscal crisis in which we live, we observe the true priorities of the government in power, whose focus is to once again manipulate results and electoral processes.”
The MVC said in the statement that in a context of crisis in sectors such as health, energy, housing and education, the use of public funds for consultations for political purposes that do not address the country’s real problems is unacceptable.
It also questioned the reliability of the SEC, rejecting the use of public resources for partisan consultations that do not meet the requirements of a true decolonization process.
“Once again a NPP governor calls for an inconsequential plebiscite to be held on the same day as the general elections. This action constitutes another exercise that only aims to divert the attention of the bad governments of the NPP to try to move their forces to the polls.