By Santy Asanumna —-
Published 2003 Whatanow Column
Alii T,
I am not surprised to hear that you and your colleagues are afraid to speak your views publicly for fear of reprisals (“mechetechat”). And you are teachers. How about the rest of us in Palau who do not have teacher status (“sensei el medengei a betok el tekoi”) like you? Sad to say, many in Palau today like you are so afraid to speak their opinions (“audesuir”). It is common for people to just swallow unjust treatment at work or neighborhood. For variety of reasons, people rather be in pain than speak out. I have always wondered about this. Maybe people saying what is bothering them or expressing their opinions on things is more painful. Why is that?
I recently talked with a friend who reminded me of what Martin Luther King said, “… this country (America in early 60’s) will not be free until the day we (Black Americans) are free to express our views” (“mo sebeched el kmu a uldesued ma osenged ra rokui el tekoi”). The fact that there are so many like you, who are not free to speak their views openly because of fear, makes me wonder if Palau is truly a free country. So is fear a good excuse for not speaking out on what we believe? What are the consequences if we choose to be quiet?
I believe it was Benjamin Franklin who reminded early American settlers by saying, “people usually deserve the type of government that they got.” He went on to say, “it is not the few crocked men (“tirkel meruul a elebirukl ma telemall”) who destroy our society but the majority of good men who keep silent on wrongdoings of few crocked men.” I too believe that majority of Palauans are good people, but we also deserve the problems we are having with our government today because most of us choose silence (“ke de mengchii a luk ra ikel betok el mekngit el dubech ra delongeled”).
Now nobody is saying anything about the difference between settlement and plea bargain. One thing that I know is criminal cases cannot be settled out of court. You must admit quilt (“kongei el kmo ke tilemelii a llach”) before a judge and bargain for lesser punishment. By the way, judge is from the Supreme Court not the popular OEK Sole Judges. So why are the four senators now returning travel money that they spent when they still claim that they did not break any laws of Palau by spending the money in the first place? Can people just take government money to use and then return it?
In business, accountability (“a rokui el klalo ma udoud a kirel el lulcherangel e keltmokl a babier lolecholt el kmo kedulusbech el mora ngarang”) on company assets, especially money is a must. Spending company money without receipts is totally unacceptable (“ng diak ke de kengei er ngii el tekoi”). Many businesses, both big and small, around the world are either struggling to survive or gone out of business because money disappeared. If a company employee is saying that money was used but cannot substantiate (“ngocholt a invoice”) where and how the money was used, a red flag should be raised on the integrity (“sel cherungel klemera ra rechad”) of that employee. If we are talking about big amount of money like ten dollars, there is a good chance that employee is thrown out. Using money without proper invoices and receipts to show where it went is the killer cancer in any business.
The problem with our government is we are not talking about ten dollars but thousands of dollars squandered (“te mla dobdobs”) by each elected official. Our elected leaders in OEK claim that they did not know for the last twenty years that use of public money should be substantiated-every penny of it because it is not their personal money to use as they wish. If this is the level of thinking that our OEK leaders, who by law control the purse for Palau, have towards money, there is no question why we are having money problems today.
Tribute to Facebook Palau 2012 Group. (January 15, 2012)
