'The greatest enemy we have is resignation:' Underwood says pessimism stalls Guam's quest for self-rule
By Jayvee Vallejera
The biggest stumbling block to Guam’s quest for sovereignty is defeatism, which ties the island down from choosing a future path for itself, according to Robert Underwood, chairman of the think tank Pacific Center for Island Security
In a yet-to-be-scheduled plebiscite, Guam voters have three political status options to choose from: statehood, independence and free association.
“The greatest enemy of sovereignty is not some federal official, although lots of them can be classified as enemies and they are eager to take on that role. The greatest enemy we have is resignation,” Underwood said in his keynote remarks at a decolonization conference held Thursday at the Hilton Guam Resort & Spa.
“This comes from our own sense of powerlessness, our lack of effort to grow what little power we have, to advocate for increased power, to move toward the exercise of sovereignty,” said the former congressman.
The apparent sense of helplessness, Underwood said, runs through many of the issues Guam faces today, such as seabed mining, holding the U.S. military accountable for environmental damage and the CHamoru’s right to exercise self-determination, a sort of colonial control masquerading as constitutional order.
Guam's non-binding plebiscite has been indefinitely postponed due to a controversy over a provision that limits the process to “native inhabitants,” which under Guam law refers to those “who became U.S. citizens by virtue of the 1950 Organic Act of Guam and descendants of those persons.”
The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, in response to a lawsuit filed by former Yigo resident Arnold “Dave” Davis, held that limiting the political status vote to a certain group of people based on race was unconstitutional. The U.S. Supreme Court declined to take up the case.
Guam is fragmented on the political status issue. Some are contented with the status quo.
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Guam must fight “colonial amnesia,” Underwood said, referring to the people's propensity to forget their history and identity.
Underwood urged conference participants to take it upon themselves to exercise every element of sovereignty that they already have and move in a direction that empowers Guam.
He said even the simple task of renaming places to their original CHamoru names, such as Tumon to Tomhom or Guam to Guahan, represents a step toward reclaiming sovereignty.
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The question of why Guam is not allowed to become a state remains unanswered because the federal government will never provide an answer, Underwood said.
“The whole point is not to give you an answer. The whole point is to have you keep thinking that there's some kind of solution out there which you can achieve. That's the whole process of it,” said Underwood, who served as president of the University of Guam for 10 years before founding the PCIS.
The conference, titled "Hita La'mon: Toward Sovereign Futures, aimed to conceptualize a sovereign Guam, focusing on tangible realities rather than just abstract ideas.
Hosted by Free Association Task Force and Commission on Decolonization, the conference invited participants to imagine what everyday life in a sovereign Guam would look like 10 years from now, according to Nolan Flores, the task force's chair.
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