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Puerto Rican rapper and founder of Calle 13, Rene Perez, better known as Residente, visited the encampment against debt restructuring in San Juan on Thursday, calling supporters around the world to show up and help.
The encampment against the “junta,” or Financial Control Board, has been tenting in front of the Federal Tribunal for nearly a month to protest the U.S. PROMESA law, signed a day after the first tent was pitched. The law created the board to ensure the repayment of the debt, which the activists say is meant to protect U.S. bondholders rather than Puerto Ricans, who are already suffering from crippling austerity measures.
The “colonial imposition” of the junta, says the Facebook page of the encampment, will only accelerate the privatization and closure of important public services.
The “encampment of different activist sectors and different political sectors,” is still in need of food and basic necessities to sustain their ongoing occupation against a debt “that is evidently not created by us,” said one of the participants in Residente’s Facebook video.
Residente called on artists and activists around the world to support the cause.
“It doesn’t bother me that people from other countries and artists from other countries join the fight,” he said.
WATCH: Residente's visit to the encampment
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