By The Star Staff
At-large Rep. José “Che” Pérez Cordero on Tuesday accused Pablo José Hernández Rivera, the Popular Democratic Party (PDP) candidate for resident commissioner, of wanting to perpetuate the colonial condition in Puerto Rico.
The legislator from the pro-statehood New Progressive Party (NPP) also said Hernández Rivera represents the immovable sector of La Pava, which wants to dominate that party.
“Yesterday we saw again how the vision of the current leadership of the PDP is to do nothing,” Pérez Cordero said. “That is the same vision that the last [PDP] governor, Alejandro García Padilla, the political boss of [PDP gubernatorial candidate] Jesús Manuel Ortiz, had. In four years of government, he did nothing to solve the status crisis, which brought the Financial Oversight and Management Board to Puerto Rico. I still remember the Joint Status Commission between the House [of Representatives] and the Senate, which never met even to approve its own regulations.”
“Status is vital for everything. However, Mr. Hernández only wants to be part of the governance of the colony. This is a punch in the face to the majority of voters who have been asking, since 2012 and in a forceful manner, to get out of the current colonial condition,” the NPP lawmaker continued. “Hernández, like his mentor, García Padilla, will not respect the electoral mandate of the people. On November 5 there is a status consultation. If statehood [prevails], as will happen, this candidate has already said that he will not work for it, meaning that he does not care what the people deliver at the polls.”
“I call on all those who are anti-colonialists to know that Hernández will go to Washington to say that the status was resolved in 1952, something that is not true,” Pérez Cordero said. “Even the other three candidates for the position of resident commissioner -- Vivina Ramírez, Ana Irma Rivera and William Villafañe -- spoke of the need to resolve this unworthy and century-old situation, all except Hernández, who wants to return Puerto Rico to the 1950s.”
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