ANALYSIS: IV It takes leadership to foster a partnership •Interior’s OIA never had it from the start

By John S. DelRosario Jr.

Publisher

Since 1993 or the beginning of the Cinton Administration, there evolved a new agenda that would have been suppressed if these islands still have their strategic importance for US defense purposes. The drop in the curtain of the cold war also left behind a cold shoulder from Uncle Sam. Paradigms changed completely from strategic to a persistent it dealt with OIA and NMI detractors going to bat for the textile labor unions.

The NMI had to dance nervously over this shift in paradigms, a bit confused over the underlying motive of such quick change in federal policy. Such policy shift which never took local efforts that have been undertaken to resolve pertinent concerns has reached the level of OIA turning into a complete adversary. It’s obvious that such purposeful neglect of progressive strides we’ve undertaken to resolve labor and immigration issues now threaten complete meltdown of the local economy.

Federal agenda is obvious. But then what else is new other than reviving Lazarus from his grave. It brings the question of leadership into focus. The sixteenth president of the United States of America remains a study among management gurus who wanted to find out what made Abraham Lincoln such a revered commander-in-chief. It was simply his ability or gift to check with the troops out in the war field who have laid their lives in defense of their country. Rather than going to the White House, he’d stop by families who’ve lost loved ones in the war to console family members. He’d also visit wounded soldiers to comfort them.

Management gurus concluded that one of the superb traits of a real leader is being able to check the troops over department secretaries who push papers all day. Such attitude should have been adopted by Interior’s OIA. It may not be legally assigned to handle matters of local sovereignty, but it would have established an excellent working relationship with the NMI had it taken its time to listen to the tiny voices of the people of these islands. It would have afforded both sides of the Pacific an opportunity to foster and nurture an understanding of issues and what needs to be done before this millennium sets into the sunset.

It chose to adopt an attitude of bully pulpit over the more friendlier approach of listening to our concerns. It wanted to supplant what rightfully belongs to the governance of these islands through federal mandates that are at best, hollow. We say hollow in that there’s this constancy to fuel animosity in our relationship which deserves the often deaf ears of federal bureaucrats. It seems that it’s their views are always right resembling the television advertisement “When EF Hutton talks, everybody listens”. Well, it wasn’t Hutton talking. It was Interior’s OIA boss Allen Stayman who expects us to listen to his heavy decibels of economic ruination.

How sad that all the opportunities lost to have established and nurtured a good working relationship. Had OIA lowered its pride so it allows itself to listen a little than the usual bully pulpit, it would have meant that it really is attuned to the real work of leadership in partnership. OIA would have climbed a tree in the thick jungles of confusion to see where it is taking its troops. With a sense of humility, OIA would have been the first to say “Wrong direction, let’s go this way”. It boggles the mind though that it doesn’t even know how to lead or climb a tree so the NMI isn’t lost in the jungles of vicious detractors.

Perhaps this is just as a good a time for the NMI to revisit its relationship with the federal government. If anything, the NMI must insist that other than defense needs, the exercise of strengthening our democratic institutions is best left in the governance of this often victimized archipelago. And for all its pitfalls committed against Americans of color both in the US mainland and those who are outside mainstream America, our mother country remains our hope in the resolution of special interest that has done nothing but breed suspicion and strife in the minds of this group of US Citizens. We deserve no less than inclusion and fairness in all proposed federal policies that affects our relationship.

As difficult as it may see, such policies must first defer to the essence of the Covenant Agreement, no more, no less. God Bless America!