"She said, 'Mami, you taught me to respect all people. We shouldn't make fun of people. Why aren't we out there with the people?'" Diaz said. Her daughter, Valerie, had just finished first grade. "She's the reason I'm here," Diaz said.Valerie held a sign with a hand-drawn Puerto Rican flag andthe message, "Don't close our schools" — one in a litany of complaints against the governor. They stood in the shade on the side of a highway in the capital of San Juan as hundreds of thousands of marchers shut down traffic Monday in a series of island-wide protests. "We want a better country when I grow up," Valerie said.A year and a half after Hurricane Maria devastated the US territory,political unrest has taken hold of the island.A broad cross-section of society turned out on Monday for what many residents said was the largest demonstration they could remember. First-time marchers were there alongside retired teachers and social workers, union members and longtime political activists, pro-statehood residents and supporters of independence. (The US acquired Puerto Rico after the Spanish-American War of 1898, and it's been a territory since 1952. Rosselló is pro-statehood.)
Leaked messages expose simmering grievances
They took to the streets after a series of crude, sexist and homophobic chat messages between the embattled governor and his closest aides were made public earlier this month.In one fell swoop, Rosselló and members of his inner circle offended nearly every one of the island's 3 million residents, taking aim at women, gay people, overweight people, a revered independence movement leader who died of cancer, and the thousands of victims of the devastating 2017 hurricane. The chat messages lit the fire — but the tinder had been building for some time. "Rosselló and his chat messages put into words what we have been feeling as people for a long time," Cynthia García Coll, a psychologist who teaches at the University of Puerto Rico at Rio Piedras, said at an anti-Rosselló street concert the night before the big march."That we are nothing. They can take our pensions. They can lower our salaries. They can take away our vacation time. They can take away our Christmas bonuses."
Rosselló becomes face of longstanding political and economic woes
Earlier this month, days before the leaked chats, FBI agents arrested two ranking Rosselló officials for allegedly directing contracts worth millions to politically connected firms.Long before this popular wave of rage and indignation, generations of Puerto Ricans endured epic levels of corruption and mismanagement at the hands of the political class, many demonstrators said. Many lived through the scandal-plagued tenure of the governor's father, Pedro Rosselló, who served as governor in the 1990s.Now Rosselló and his government have given a name and face to long-festering political and economic wounds, according to many demonstrators."Ricky, renuncia!" ("Ricky, resign!")has become the mantra of the nightly gatherings of boisterous demonstrators on the cobblestone streets one block from governor's mansion, a historic 16th-century structure known as La Fortaleza. "This is a historic moment," Elba Nazario, 63, who retired after working 30 years as a teacher, said near the governor's mansion Sunday night. "There is no turning back. It's very emotional. I've sat on this street and cried from seeing so many people, young and old, come out."
"We march for all Puerto Ricans," said Mariana Rivera, 77, as four of her teenage grandchildren pushed her wheelchair under a blistering sun along Las Americas expressway. "What will we leave for our children?"
Governor admits 'mistakes' but won't to step down
A 12-year economic recession and Puerto Rico's ballooning debt crisis resulted in shuttered schools, cuts in government services, layoffs and university tuition hikes. In 2016, the US Congress created a board to oversee the island's finances — a body that has becomeRead More – Source
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