by Luis Alejandro Molina
On Sunday, August 16, over 125 activists and sympathizers of the Puerto Rican independence movement marched through the South Bronx denouncing 128 years of US colonialism and condemning the Fiscal Oversight Board (aka La Junta).
The Fiscal Oversight Board, known as La Junta, was imposed 10 years ago and controls all budgetary decisions in Puerto Rico. Members of La Junta are appointed by the President. Recently, budget cuts have slashed the University of Puerto Rico’s budget in half and led to the closure of one-third of Puerto Rico’s public schools.
Meeting at Lincoln Hospital, made famous by the takeover by the Young Lords in 1970, various speakers pointed to the increasingly severe crisis facing workers on the island, manifested in days on end without running water, frequent blackouts, high unemployment, and a severe housing crisis—all of them consequences of more than 100 years of U.S. colonial rule.
The march then proceeded down 149th Street to St. Mary’s Park, a few blocks away, where the event concluded with additional speeches and a bomba.
