People participate during a march from the capitol to demand independence for Puerto Rico
SAN JUAN (Puerto Rico), Sept 1 (NNN-TELESUR) — Approximately 3,000 people marched through the historic streets of Old San Juan in favor of Puerto Rican independence, an initiative that also expanded to several cities in the United States with the purpose of demanding the decolonization of the island.
The March For The Independence of Puerto Rico, as this event was named, started from the south side of the Capitol (Parliament), after the singer iLe performed the revolutionary anthem, to travel along San Francisco Street until reaching the Federal Court.
Making a call to attend to the march, about twenty political and social organizations declared that “Puerto Rico has been a colony of the United States of America for 127 years; since then there has always been a demand for freedom from important sectors of our people who have sometimes claimed to be the majority of the population.”
Among the groups convened are the National Alliance Against Displacement, the Feminist Collective in Construction, the Caribbean Commune, the Committee for Human Rights, the Committee of Solidarity with Cuba, the Filiberto Ojeda Ríos Day, the Day The Promises Are Over, Las Lolitas, the Hostosian National Independence Movement and the Socialist Workers’ Movement.
In addition, spokesmen said that from the beginning of this violent relationship, the Americans devalued Puerto Rico’s currency and stripped Puerto Ricans of their lands and businesses by imposing themselves militarily, politically and economically.
According to the organizations, the crisis in Puerto Rico is not resolved “with patches or mere goodwill; it requires structural changes in the political, economic and social.”
The march commemorates 40 years since the arrests of the Macheteros in 1985 and 20 years since the assassination of Filiberto Ojeda Ríos in 2005, two milestones of the independence movement. In addition to remembering the Jayuya Revolution of 1950 and figures such as Pedro Albizu Campos, Blanca Canales and Heriberto Marín, the march seeks to promote a public debate on independence and colonialism in Puerto Rico.
Jenniffer Gonzalez, the new governor of Puerto Rico and a member of the New Progressive Party (PNP), has vowed to fight for the island’s annexation to the United States in order to achieve “full equality” for all Puerto Ricans.
Gonzalez, a defender of the ‘Statehood’ movement, argues that annexation would allow Puerto Rico to have access to the same opportunities as the U.S. states, pointing out that this option received support in a non-binding referendum held on November 5, where 56.87% of voters chose statehood over independence or free association, although there was a significant number of blank votes due to a boycott by other political parties. — NNN-TELESUR
