Thank you to UIC and Onwel

With the recent announcements by United International Corp. and Onwel Garment Manufacturers that their operations will close later this month and the next, there’s not a lot left of Saipan’s garment industry, nor a lot left that can be said.

Putting aside the division between those that supported the industry and those that went to every length to get rid of it, I believe there’s something most important that needs to be said to these two factory owners that recently announced their closures two weeks ago.

Maybe more than the others that have gone before them, these two owners had excellent relationships with their clients and their employees and with Saipan.

To James Lin at United International Corp., and to Michael Leung at Onwel, from me for the people who haven’t said anything yet, or for the people who can’t find a way to do it, or for those who really don’t understand it, I want to thank you for every one of the thousands and thousands of jobs you provided people from Saipan, the Philippines, Thailand, China, all the Micronesian islands and everywhere else in the world that you employed.

I want to thank you for everything you did for those employees who, in turn, did what they did for their families.

I thank you for what you did for the CNMI with the millions and millions of dollars you contributed in taxes and government fees while you made clothing for America’s department stores. By my estimation, UIC has easily paid over $100 million to the CNMI in user fees and payroll taxes alone since they established their operations.

And, as a business owner, I thank you for helping me with my business serving you. Everyone would surely thank you if they knew how much you gave to churches, schools and the community over the past 20 years.

Thank you for everything you’ve done for everyone.

I got a telephone call from someone in the U.S. today telling me about another pathetic Bill Moyer exposé on Jack Abramoff, and his relationship with the CNMI and Saipan’s garment industry. It’s amazing that people still think there’s a question about whether the industry was good, or bad, for people here. Not there, here.

That’s the division I wanted to put aside for this letter. That’s the tragicomedy of the story about the industry. People today, with a presidential election looming in the United States, still want to climb aboard the Saipan garment industry to get political mileage out of an industry that provided so much and was meaningful to those living here. Trust me, this story will be told and retold until it’s absolutely lost all semblance of the truth.

In James Lin’s factory entrance foyer there’s a letter from a visiting U.S. congressman who toured United International Corp. in the ’90s. The letter personally thanks Mr. Lin for the tour of his excellent facility and wishes him well.

That letter is from the same U.S. Representative who just before his last re-election bid ran the same old lame “indentured servitude, sweatshop, abortion and injured workers” boilerplate.

That Representative’s state has the largest sweatshop industry in the United States and strong campaign funding unions that filed suit in U.S. District with class action attorneys recently convicted and jailed for their dirty and illegal work.

That’s the CNMI’s friend, Congressman George Miller.

Miller, like a lot of others, champions himself for the humungous work done on Saipan in eliminating the on-again, off-again horrible situations that now either do, or don’t, exist, depending upon the mainland election cycle.

And, that’s too bad. While Mr. Lin and Mr. Leung were providing for so many, and lost in all the political noise, is what actually happened inside the Saipan garment industry while all the pathetic political parasites attached themselves to their host.

The industry was cleaned up. No one has ever said, most assuredly me, that there were no problems inside this industry. The shame is that it’s as if nothing ever changed. That the industry is as it was 15 years ago, according to Ms. Magazine, Bill Moyer and all the Johnnie-come-lately labor activist on a soapbox types.

I, personally, thank Mr. Lin and Mr. Leung and all the others that did the right thing over the past decade in protecting their employees, their investments and the CNMI. Thank you.
[B] Richard A. Pierce[/B] [I]As Mahetog, Saipan