FSM Ambassador to the United States Discusses Relationship with U.S., Background, and Connections

good afternoon everyone today we have the honor to speak today with uh ambassador aquino cezaya who is the micronesia federated states of micronesia ambassador to washington dc to the united states here in washington dc and this is part of our oia conversation series getting to know talking about different programs and also getting to know different officials who are from the different insular areas and how their work uh how their work impacts our work at office of insular affairs as well as the relationship with the united states and also the different programs that we fund i'm accompanied today by philippe izerian who is a intern student from the universe duke university so happy to have his support with us today uh without further ado mr ambassador thank you very much for the honor to have a conversation with you today welcome yay thank you dania and philip for this opportunity to engage in this free-flowing conversation to introduce some more provide more information on the fsm especially the mission here on what is going on i believe this opportunity is timely since we are currently engaged in the as you know the negotiations with the us government on the expiring provisions of our current compact free association so i hope i can not divulge information in the comeback but uh just briefly share with you what we're doing but before doing so i i was kind of puzzled that when tanya introduced and said my name she said agliano susaya she left out my middle name i guess it's for a reason because the middle name is harris yeah anyway yeah i'm ready to prepare to help you with this program i think this program is very like i said it's timely and important as it is always our uh objective the mission to engage and improve our uh relations in terms of uh engaging with the us federal government it's a huge bureaucracy so we always try our best to engage with the appropriate offices and departments so we can get whatever we can to help continue the work of building our nation ambassador you have a very big job as you mentioned working with the federal government in washington dc can you tell us a little bit about the different agencies that you do work with the department of interior is the implementing department of the compact but on the other side of that is the diplomatic relationships that we have that that the embassy is responsible for to deal with the state government and of course working with the state government we engage with the other agencies such as usaid the national security council and and the other departments that have programs in the fsm like usda department of education department of health and human services and others especially to follow up or help them when they are engaged in their programs to implement their programs in the fsm just to clarify the state department handles the diplomatic relationship with the federated states of micronesia and then any compact funding that flows through the compact flows through the department of the interior but then there are also many other federal agencies that have programs that also provide funding and support to the federated states of micronesia i'd like to ask you about your background i started working right after high school after i graduated from xavier as a part-time staffer at the pompeii legislature for several years and i became a permanent staff then i was able to pursue my education first at the kapiolani college and then from there to the university of south pacific and then to the university of hawaii manoa and was able to complete my education at the university of oregon then after that i returned back and worked at the legislature again in pumbi for almost a year then i was hired as the general manager of the plumbing port authority the authority responsible for the airport the only airport international airport in bombay and the ski port for about i guess about one five five five or six years then i was fortunate to be appointed by the president then to become the secretary of the everson department of transportation communication and infrastructure that's when we started fsm and fva started working on the program to implement the provision of the compact which allows every opportunity to tap in or access faa crayons and i like this to be understood in one of our my first visits up here in tc was his staff but i was working at the emerson embassy and she helped me drove me to the department of transportation to meet with the officials there and then when we got back the embassy car was stowed away she parked the vehicle at the wrong no parking zone or i guess something but they good thing about that experience we were i was able to sign off on the first uh trench of fva funding for about 20 some million dollars to start the airport improvement projects in the fsm was that the airport improvement program ambassador yes that's the airport improvement program that we use to upgrade our navigational net navigation receives the ar aircraft rescue firefighting and also constructed the new aircraft rescue and fire fighting facilities in the four states wow and i've seen the one in ponbae that's a really beautiful building right down on the runway on the side yeah it is state of the art you know meeting fva requirements from the old days yes when it was like in a shack uh you've alluded to a couple of things mr ambassador that maybe we should address uh yes i did used to work for the embassy of micronesia in washington dc before um i was the first secretary at the embassy before i worked before i started working for the office of insular affairs at the u.s department of the interior and then you also mentioned the harris name can you tell us about that a little bit well i may be wrong because my my knowledge of that xp family may not be as accurate as you're standing i know you're a fan of fam working on family drills but anyway uh my mother is harris and your kramba is harris and they were brothers or sisters yeah yeah so your dad and i were first cousins yes uh i remember i was little when you were uh going to school in the united states and abroad you were you know an uncle who was actually always away or somewhere going to school when i was growing up in the island so yes just to for for our viewers uh my father is from ponbae in the federated states of micronesia related to to the esteemed ambassador and my mother is from the united states from boise idaho growing up i always try to see if i can follow your dad's footsteps because she was in the family very was very successful in his education and in life too he was a senator in our office from congress and as you know tanya a very close confidant of the late speaker petrol henry can you please speak to that we just heard news today that the first the mr bethwell henry an esteemed uh micronesian diplomat and an official has passed away can you tell us a little bit about him yeah well yeah but bethel was one of our founding fathers he was uh after college he was one of the few was able to finish college four-year college at the university of hawaii manoa went back and became the first speaker of our old congress the old congress of my indonesia for i i i believed the duration of the trust territory of the pacific islands when the islands were still under the trusteeship agreement thereafter our first constitutional government in 1979 when our congress of the fsm was established he was also elected as the first speaker and deal he retired or i i think he decided to run for another office yeah but it's a great loss for the episode recently he was with our comeback uh negotiating team and my last uh well not really engagement i had the privilege of seeing him on virtual when we had our last internal meetings before the second round of our negotiations i think was like several weeks ago wow very very wonderful human being i would say and a consummate politician i wanted to let you know that the office of insular affairs of course the the leader of our office assistant secretary dominic uh is will be sending over a letter of condolence and and uh with that letter uh you uh should know that there will be many people in the office of insular affairs who uh past co-workers and and current who uh uh you know feel um well their their feelings and emotions are are also expressed in the condolences so i just wanted to share that with you thank you for that yes we've been receiving at least i've been receiving some emails messages from some of his friends it's just unfortunate that because of the uh guidelines from this pandemic we're not able to open a condolence book which is usually the practice when a leader passed i just received oh so you will not be opening a book of condolences at the embassy yes we cannot open because right now our embassy we're we're in a way close by we're monitoring our phones and then rotating people going in once in a while they check the mail and all that but we're not open to the public as you know the the spike in the tc area is not is uh still pretty high i think most of the embassies are still going through distant work conducting social distancing yeah mr ambassador you mentioned the ttpi where were you when the federated states of micronesia transitioned from the ttpi to the fsm well in 1979 that was like three years after i graduated from high school and savior i was at the pumping legislature as a young staffer legislative aide and the excitement of those days when everson celebrated our nationhood was very great we had uh the president at the time the first president the constitutional government celebration of the first inauguration of our first constitutional government was held at the field in right in town big gathering yeah so as a young man i was so excited i really wanted to remain working in the government to help whatever i can to help continue the nation-building efforts so here we are how many years already and i i can attest to the fact that every summer has come a long way do you mention the compact negotiations uh and we won't get into anything specific but are you part of that team well yes we are i am and my deputy are part of it as resource people on the crown along with our legal staff who are working from a law firm here retained by the government yeah so we are but we don't fold on the issues we we provide you know whatever we contribute to the discussions and and broadly speaking uh how do uh people in the federated states of micronesia feel in general about uh the compact and the relationship with the united states at least i know the people are really pro-america because of the fact that you know we've allowed the generation that is now like the dominant uh factor in the in the ever some now are all porn right after world war ii and they they you know they feel like evasion was liberated by the u.s and so the feeling of alliance is very strong in this generation this pro-america and most of us were educated or are educated in the u.s educational systems so i can see the our relationship with the us to continue indefinitely you know mr ambassador we we touched upon our relationship uh secretary though when he went to the pacific islands forum he mentioned that uh that we the united states are a pacific nation and when the secretary of the navy was in palau recently he uh in his remarks with the president of palau is talking about brothers and sisters um i think that our relationship attests to that as well as there are many uh micronesians who serve in the us armed forces there are american families who have served in the military and been out in the pacific there are american families who have somebody who've served in the peace corps in micronesia so uh i i think that the relationship is very broad and very deep linkage between our peoples is getting stronger and stronger every year the relationship between peoples in fact are in their marriages the number of people either married to american men or american man married to a female magnition getting bigger and bigger every year and our people most of our people are also migrating out here to the to the states here and are now living and their kids are now there are lots of them that are born here or those that came as young people are you being raised in the american way of living going to schools and of course we have our civ our citizens who serve in the military not only serving in the military but giving opportunities to go to some of the military academies yes that's a provision that was provided under the compact i believe and some of your i believe your secretary of finance currently yeah is a graduate of the naval academy yes yes quite impressive yes um mr ambassador do you have i believe you have a son who's in the military i have my youngest is in the army based in kansas fort riley so that's my contribution well we thank you for his service um you mentioned migration is there any concern about um migration out of micronesia and uh is there any what what is what are your thoughts on that well i have mixed feelings on that you know it's always difficult to control uh out migration over people because it's a privilege given to them under the comebacks and for the government to just say no you cannot do it anymore it's kind of difficult to do that but the effect of it in terms of our own the development in the islands it's also a concern because most of our young and young people are leaving seeking better jobs and opportunities in the u.s and leaving a big void out in the islands but the flip side of it is it it's also helping our economy in terms of the remedies is that our people are sending back home to their families which is i understand the last time i heard it was over in the 20 more than the 20 million dollars or so annually that is going into the economy so that is also really you can see these days i am told that with the covet even with the covet people are lining up at the western union almost every day to receive their money especially now during this holiday season yeah so that is also a benefit or a to our economy and to our efforts to continue our development efforts of our country but the challenge is really for them and that's what i have always been emphasizing in terms of my engagement with them to know that this is a privilege it's not the right for them to live work and go to school in this country and that they must abide with the laws and the ordinances of the community start living in because they they are they like anybody who is living in the u.s this is a country of laws rule of law is very important and any violations may create you know may lead them into may lead them to be deported out of this country depending on the seriousness of the violations so i always try my best to remind them of that and that they should take advantage of this privilege and not to abuse it how many micronesians would you estimate are are in the united states well the last uh audit or survey that the ceo did is it's over more than 47 000 ever some citizens all across the u.s and and especially in guam which is closer to the other summer um speaking of guam i understand you have a consulate on guam and maybe some can you tell us about your diplomatic posts in the u.s we have the mission here in dc and we we work with our consulates the class we have the consulate in hawaii honolulu and one in guam and one which was recently opened last sometime last year uh in portland oregon so every now and then we work help them out on their consular issues or matters let's talk a little bit about micronesia um can you tell us a little bit about the four states and how that impacts government and governing of an island nation that's a very good question and people want to answer too because as you know uh we have divergent cultures languages but the political expediency of administering the islands since the end of world war ii which created the trust territory of the pacific islands i i can say it led to this help also our leaders our founding fathers when they were able to unite and create this country called the fsm last but the constitution itself so it recognizes the state's rights and all that the national government doesn't own land in the states unlike the u.s government where the federal government owns land in all the 50 states so the difficulty of implementing projects and all that is always there when the national government decides on a project it has to work closely with the state where that project will be located yeah but uh all this really points to the fact that the loose federation that is the underlying concept of our government where the national government is only given certain duties and responsibilities and all the rest that are not national in nature are given to the states and so coordination and is really really important working with the state governments of course like any other developing country we always run into problems with between the national and the states on important issues but then i'm glad at the end of the day we always find a way to compromise do you think that this loose federation is becoming stronger or does it have um some important challenges that it how how is it how is it doing how is the federation i i want to believe that the the unity forces in the country is getting stronger and and that again used the truck separation movement several years ago as an example which kind of failed in its tracks and i i am sure you will agree with me that this although the loose federation concept is there our leaders and our people understand that the central government's role the day-to-day affairs is also important so i hope we will continue to have a loose federation but at the same time a central government that is capable of holding together this country for the years to come you uh mentioned uh how about traditional leaders is there in my conversation with palau we talked about the role of traditional leadership and and that doesn't exist really in the u.s style of government but this the fsm is is modeled after the u.s form of government i i think you know i am one who believed that this separation of church and state is good in the u.s system and the westminster system of government and i i also believe that although it is also reflected in our constitutions it should have at least go a little bit further into how the traditional system should play in this republic because especially for let me make let me use bombay as an example our traditional leadership our traditional system in bombay is very strong uh bombay it is very difficult because some of our leaders are also high traditional titles although they are in the government also and our respect for our traditional system in pump is very strong to not to recognize the traditional system it's like making yourself left out of the oh you know be left out of it yeah so you have to but like i said it's always important to know where the traditional system starts and ends and where the government picks up because we have a constitutional government and we have traditional system with this really monarchy so i i believe that when it comes to the decisions that have to affect the government the leaders the government leaders should make the decision not really the traditional leadership same thing with the traditional leaders they should be those making decisions relating to the traditions and what have you in the traditional system because these are two completely different systems of governing the people i i hadn't thought of that as uh until today about that being a challenge but i can see how that can be can be difficult um is this something that you talked about as a delegate uh when you at the you were a delegate to the fourth fsm constitutional convention which i believe was last year yes i i was i was able to as you know we had one of our traditional leaders in our bombay delegation and so we wanted to see where we can fit freedom in terms of the leadership of the count of the convention itself and some of us felt that we need to make you more the presiding officer i was one of those who felt that it's not the proper role for the our traditional leader because it's completely different being a traditional leader and a presiding officer was a presiding officer even of a congress or convention or anybody in the convention or in the congress can ask you or to make a motion to tell you what to do which in our traditional system cannot be done nobody can tell our traditional leaders what to do so that's what i felt and i was able to convince my delegates my colleagues that we should not pursue that uh thinking that we need to have our that our that particular traditional leader as our presiding officer of the convention but put him somewhere that you would be respected but at the same time properly probably respected incredible um mr ambassador how about the idea of citizenship dual citizenship it's kind of hit it was heated up because as you know some of our citizens who are in the military were offered u.s citizenship because their uh the requirement of the work the nature of the work they do in the military they have to be given citizenship for security purposes and all that so some of them took it up and now they've retired from the military they went back they're back in the islands and are having difficulty to either build a house to use the land as a mortgage because they cannot own land so that's one of the reasons why the tool citizenship proposal was adopted by the convention to address those kind of people and also of course a lot of our people have migrated here have kids who are born in the u.s and because of that they cannot go back and claim ownership of their whatever traditional lands that they have back there from their in their inerted land that have from their parents or grandparents so i hope this time around this i think this should be the third or fourth time to put that put forth this proposal to the people and i am one of those that really believe we need to get this as part of the constitution not to deny our citizens the privilege to write to their inheritance that's a difficult challenge um i have there are two more subjects i'd like to touch base with you on uh let's let's start with china you have the unique experience of being both ambassador fsm ambassador to china and fsm ambassador to the united states can you talk to us about that the experience really helped prepare me for this for my role now as the msm ambassador here our relationship with china it's not the difficulty of it is that it's not like based on a written document like the compact where it spells out specifically what the fsm has granted china and what we we hold the responsibilities are not clearly delineated in terms of uh implementing our bilateral relationship as opposed to what we have in the u.s uh yeah the u.s we have to come back to free association we just read them it's a treaty very clear so we we know what we can do what we can ask the u.s and what we expect the u.s that to do in terms of what has been credited to the us under that treaty but china is very it's so proud just uh it was it's based on a policy that is not clearly divine that we we recognize china because in our constitution we we are in a way it's not really our foreign policy but in our constitution we we promote friendship with all those countries every all countries and we we have no enemies so in a way that that uh marching order for the arts in the department when we especially when you're in the china mission it's very difficult to say okay but when it comes to security and secure the interests of the fsm we always have to abide by what is in the combat and yes it's a big difference working in china and working in the u.s but i'm glad i was able to be given that hunter the opportunity the privilege of now to import i know your favorite is in the united states yeah it is i went to school here so yeah so you're a duck you're an oregon duck yeah i'm an oregon duck are you in touch with anybody from oregon yeah well i was uh in touch with when he was still your boss at the interior some you know i think uh wishing like holiday seasons and all that with former secretary yes ryan zinke he was a very strong supporter of the freely associated states fsm marshals and palau and he was instrumental in pushing and advocating for the visit at the white house yes that's very true he was in fact that meeting we had with him that's when the issue first came up yes and that our effort to arrange for that visit to the white house yes it was then uh president peter christian christian and and i was i was staffing i was a staffer in that meeting i remember hearing and listening to to the conversation unfortunately the poor of them left office before the fishing materialized it just goes to show how it takes time to to work on issues that's like i said the bureaucracy here is so huge now mr ambassador it looks like your picture background behind you it looks like you are in micronesia can you tell us about that picture it's a it's a picture of my uh place when we were just finishing up the wall the retaining wall so i took it back then when we just finished it then i was going through my pictures to use it for my zoom meetings so that i can cover up my my background then i saw it i said oh i'll put it on so i'll but then you know all this time i really miss going going back home yes which brings us to covid so you have not been able to travel back home and mrs ambassador is in micronesia while you are here in washington dc well you know the the good thing about technology these days you have the messenger facebook that is not just for my personal but we we have some important meetings that we need to have to travel to either hawaii or pompeo you know chengo the joint committee meetings and now with the comeback negotiations it's always good to have this kind of meetings in the islands sometimes so tell us about covid mr ambassador the federated states of micronesia is one of the few remaining countries to have no covid19 yes our our borders are still closed and uh i guess we we would be able to open up if we get some assistance in terms of the vaccines i receive your thank you for the information you shared with me yesterday i was able to send it home and our people back there were very happy to know that we are in the plans of the federal government to receive assistance on these vaccines yes i should just highlight and and we'll share on the screen but um the administration and congress have been very uh have included the insular areas the territories and and the freely associated states in uh very important funding assistance under covid uh the cares act there are several legislative uh pieces that have been passed that include that important support and uh the recent press release to which the ambassador is referring is the operation warp speed and and the inclusion of the us territories and the freely associated states in those plans for vaccine distribution so um that just attests again to the special and the unique relationship that the united states has with the fas so can i just it's the the the decision is still the work is still in progress in terms of how many each of the islands will get and when so there's a meeting there's a federal partners meeting that meets every week with uh the island the island health officers and uh that i'm aware of the the health officials from each of the islands the fas and the territories included uh we have one of our staffers who is on that call they meet two to three times a week and have been meeting since the beginning of the since march of this past uh this year and uh so these conversations are ongoing these discussions are ongoing and um so really i don't have the details but um you know i would refer you to cdc uh i mean i can help you offline to find more information if if needed if you'd like to be directed to those folks who are involved in those discussions yeah i will i'll appreciate that but yes uh and also i received a copy of a letter uh i think last week or several weeks ago from congressman uh sublime he shared with me that some of his colleagues sign off on like chairman krav and to cdc asking for the evaes and the insular areas to be prioritized or whatever to be included in the distribution of the and i i think in the letter in that letter also they were recommending that the cdc work with the po pacific island health association yes in terms of the logistics of weather and i think that's a good entity to work with for cdc to work with yes the pacific island health officers association has members from all of of health officers from all of the territories and the fas and and i know that the office of insular affairs worked with them in the beginning of the the pandemic when it was first announced uh to get funding out there for testing machines to be um placed in all of the island areas uh i mentioned in a different interview that this was actually a very good move given that now the travel has now become severely restricted thank you very much for the opportunity to speak with you today and uh again look for we will be forwarding soon a letter of condolences from from our assistant secretary through through the government channels to you and and through our us embassy in colonia thank you dania thank you philippe for this opportunity to engage with you on this discussion on this very important discussion i hope we can continue to carry on this kind of engagement it helps i think both the us and the fsm thank you for for your time and uh we we appreciate the relationship that we have with uh the federated states of micronesia it goes deeper than just the compact of reassociation uh i think that uh and so thank you again for for your time yeah before we sign off uh next week is christmas so let me wish you both the best for the holiday season for you and your families thank you very much thank you you

Channel: Insular Affairs

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Id: H4G6wkQrX-M

Length: 45min 52sec (2752 seconds)

Published: Mon Jan 04 2021