Begaye: ‘We should never have gone down this road’
Navajo Nation President-elect Russell Begaye, left, and Vice President-elect Jonathan Nez speak about their plans during a press conference on Wednesday morning, April 22, 2015, in Window Rock. (Times photo - Donovan Quintero)
WINDOW ROCK
Navajo Nation President-elect Russell Begaye said he wants to see the Nation move forward and so do the Navajo people.
Korean War veteran Juan Becenti form St. Michaels, Ariz., speaks to Navajo Nation President elect Russell Begaye about the issues the Navajo veterans face during a press conference on Wednesday morning, April 22, 2015, in Window Rock. (Times photo – Donovan Quintero)
“We should never have gone down this road,” he said of the mangled election process.
A top priority for Begaye is building a task force to make sure the next election runs smoothly.
“We need to revisit our election process and make sure that it’s a fair process. Make sure that it honors every vote,” he said during a press conference Wednesday morning.
Vice President-elect Jonathan Nez agreed that it’s time to move past the election issues.
“We’ll move forward,” Nez said. “It’s time we get to work.”
One of the goals of the president-elect is to bring people home. Bring Navajos back to the reservation to help in building a new nation.
“They were raised here. They left our nation, went out there, got educated and achieved the things that they are doing now. They just want to come back and help us,” he said, adding that many are willing to come home to help, even if it means pay cuts.
Nez said that when they go to Washington D.C., they meet these Navajos who left because the door wasn’t open for them to stay and work on the Navajo Nation. They were either not qualified or overqualified, he said.
Highway 264,
I-40, WB @ Winslow