Latest / Simply Bitcoin / Maya Parbhoe | The Next Bitcoin President? | Simply Bitcoin IRL

Transcript

Maya Parbhoe | The Next Bitcoin President? | Simply Bitcoin IRL · Simply Bitcoin

0:00
Hello everybody, welcome to another episode of Simply
0:03
Bitcoin IRL. Today we have a very special
0:06
guest. We have Maya Pirabu.
0:08
I hope I pronounced that correctly.
0:10
But before we get her on stage, I do want to give a very special
0:14
shout out to simply Bitcoins lead sponsor makes the show
0:17
possible. Of course, I'm talking about
0:19
best place to build your automatic self custody Bitcoin
0:22
stack. I'm talking about
0:23
bitcoinwell.com. It's automatic self custody.
0:27
What does that mean? That means every time you buy a
0:29
Bitcoin on Bitcoin, well as soon as the funds clear, it goes
0:32
straight to yourself. Custody Bitcoin wallet address,
0:35
which perfectly aligned to the simply Bitcoin ethos of the
0:38
separation of money and state because after all, self custody
0:41
is the revolution. To get started, head over to
0:43
bitcoinwell.com today and use promo code simply BTC to get 3
0:49
tosses into the Bitcoin wishing well, which essentially gives
0:52
you an opportunity to win up to 1,000,000 SAT every time you
0:55
toss a coin into the wishing well.
0:57
Anyways, everybody, I do want to bring Maya up on stage.
1:01
Maya, one through 10. How did I pronounce your last
1:04
name? A nine and a half, 9 1/2.
1:08
That's pretty good. It's pretty good.
1:09
So I, I was, I was like, Oh my God, she's going to give me a
1:12
four. Anyways, Maya, I am so excited
1:14
for you to join us on the show you're running for US office in
1:19
Surinam. Surinam is, is, it's an
1:21
interesting country. It's in South America.
1:25
It's actually very close to where I'm originally from.
1:28
I'm originally from Venezuela. So I think a lot of people are
1:32
just, they're not familiar with that part of the world.
1:35
And it's just interesting to to to speak, to speak to someone
1:39
from that side of the world. Yeah, not many people have
1:44
visited. I mean, not many people that I,
1:47
I actually meet actually even know where it is.
1:51
So yeah, you're actually pretty close with Venezuela, Venezuela,
1:55
Guyana, Suriname, and then French Gran and then again
1:59
Brazil. So yeah, northern coast of South
2:01
America, just like Venezuela. Absolutely.
2:04
And it sounds like you got the accent down pack for Venezuela
2:07
too. Anyways, go ahead.
2:14
The accent. I mean, but you say it.
2:17
You say it as if you're Venezuelan.
2:19
You say the country with the action.
2:22
Oh yeah, you say, you say, you say Venezuela and everything.
2:25
It's interesting. It's interesting.
2:28
We have a Venezuelan community here as well.
2:32
OK, it there's a big Venezuelan community in Syria now.
2:35
Yeah. Interesting.
2:37
Yeah. So you're also the founder of of
2:40
and hopefully I pronounced this correctly to the name of it's
2:45
Derdis Labs. Is that correct?
2:47
Daedalus Labs. For that one you get a.
2:50
That's pretty hard. Like I, I, I hope I get a pass
2:53
on that one. Yeah, yeah.
2:55
Daedalus Labs. It's it's a Greek mythology.
2:58
It was an architect and the developer of, you know, the
3:03
wings made of wax for Icarus. And then like that's the story
3:08
where Icarus got close to the sun, his like the wings melted.
3:13
What? So tell us a little bit, because
3:15
I'm really interested to hear about you running for office in
3:18
Suriname, because I truly believe like we just need more
3:22
people that are Bitcoin friendly and supportive of Bitcoin in in
3:27
in office. And I think that's going to
3:28
create environments where it's, it's a creates positive
3:32
regulatory environments. And I think we need that more
3:36
around the world. But I want to focus on that
3:38
specifically because that name is really interesting to me.
3:41
You obviously put a lot of thought behind it.
3:44
There's Greek mythology attached to it.
3:46
So first of all, what does Deridis Labs do and what
3:52
inspired you to found it? Well, actually, so I I started
3:58
out with an import company when I was 15 and that's named quick
4:01
ship. And then about a decade ago or a
4:04
little over a decade ago, I started my second company,
4:07
Icarus Geosystems. Started that with my Co founder
4:12
who's a civil engineer. And we focused on innovating in
4:16
infrastructure here and bringing, you know, technology
4:21
that is already pretty normal in other countries such as the US
4:25
or Europe, bringing that to Surinam.
4:28
And we developed Icarus over a couple of years.
4:32
We've done ports, so infrastructure, roads, dams,
4:36
dikes, primarily for oil and gas and also for public works here
4:42
and project developers. So hence Icarus.
4:47
That was the, the, the second company name and basically this
4:53
is so, this is so very funny. So out of that company, we could
4:57
invest into something else. We, we hit about, I think 5.8
5:00
million in the peak right before COVID And out of their revenue,
5:06
you know, we, we had some profit that we could reinvest.
5:09
And then we wanted to reinvest into something that I was
5:12
passionate about because civil engineering is not really, you
5:16
know, I don't want to spend the rest of my life doing that.
5:19
It's not something I'm truly passionate about.
5:21
And in the meantime, I was already obsessed with, with
5:24
Bitcoin and I'd already been obsessed with stocks and, and
5:29
tech companies just since I was a kid.
5:31
And then basically the intersection between financial
5:36
markets and Bitcoin and, and how you know that new system that
5:41
Bitcoin enabled that is not as centralized as, you know, the
5:45
central banking system, How would that work?
5:49
What would that look like? Our country doesn't have a
5:53
capital market. It's an, it's a like an excel
5:55
sheet on a laptop that goes around once a month.
5:59
And it's just like 11 companies that are owned by the same
6:02
people. It's barely, there's barely any
6:04
trading. They had like 6K in volume in
6:08
the past year. So it's, it's completely non
6:12
developed and that's a like a cornerstone of the economy
6:15
that's basically missing for people to be able to invest, you
6:18
know, into people that they believe in or people that can
6:22
actually generate a return. Because not everybody has that,
6:25
you know, entrepreneurial bone in their body or can generate,
6:29
generate a return or create a company.
6:32
And that also makes it harder for companies to grow and scale.
6:36
And I was looking at, you know, other countries and for the US
6:40
capital market, for example, how a company that like, like us,
6:44
for example, you have 5.8 million in revenue, how much
6:46
capital can you raise and, and how can it help you to grow?
6:50
For us, it was extremely hard. Here banks charge between 18 to
6:55
24% interest rates on commercial loans.
7:00
So that makes you immediately non, you know, not competitive
7:05
and makes it harder for A to, to run a business in, in, you know,
7:09
in this environment. So looking at all the problems
7:13
that we face here, we don't have financial infrastructure, we
7:15
don't have payment infrastructures.
7:17
There's no payment processors. The banks didn't have online
7:20
banking or wallets back then. Like how would all that that
7:25
develop here? And that's when I started to
7:28
work on developing the capital market here.
7:30
And out of that actually came auto X.
7:33
And auto X is basically just gold with an extra exchange.
7:39
And you know, Bitcoin being digital gold, it made sense.
7:42
Our country basically being one of the major gold destinations
7:46
in, in the Caribbean on or on the continent, you know, kind of
7:50
like El Dorado. So it kind of made sense to, to
7:53
name the, the exchange that and it's that that's how it evolved.
7:59
And I think I, I, I did fly too close to the sun with auto X, to
8:03
be honest. We started working with the
8:04
governor here. Everything was ready.
8:08
The exchange was ready to launch.
8:10
We were ready to issue the 1st 190 million bond issuance and
8:13
then our central bank governor got locked up in a political
8:16
trial. So due to, yeah, so due to
8:19
political instability, we got delayed and like the the cost to
8:25
just keep the exchange and it was self funded, so the cost to
8:27
keep the exchange up and running for a longer duration of time
8:31
just wasn't viable. So we wanted to wait until we
8:34
actually could launch it or could start up that market again
8:39
before we launched that. And then we shifted focus to
8:43
another product that we had on the road map, which is a Bitcoin
8:47
real estate investment trust. And that's how how Daedalus
8:52
basically came to be. And Daedalus, as you know, is,
8:54
is Icarus's father, and he's the one that cautioned him not to
8:58
fly too close to the sun or. I love that.
9:02
Yes, the story actually now in hindsight, it actually is
9:06
playing out kind of like the like the historical, like the,
9:12
the, the mythology, basically him being an inventor, an
9:16
architect, you know, imagining things that were never possible
9:21
or, or wouldn't be imaginable in those times, like, you know, a
9:24
human flying. And now we actually do.
9:27
So that's the same thing we want to do with Icarus.
9:29
We want to create a world where you don't need a mortgage,
9:33
right? Because we're all Bitcoiners,
9:34
but most of us can't afford to buy our house outright.
9:38
Some, a lot of us are still tied to our mortgage.
9:41
So how do you use existing financial infrastructure,
9:44
existing regulation to kind of build a model like Blackstone,
9:51
for example, but not to benefit just the top 1%, but to, to
9:56
benefit everyone? And how do you pressure that?
9:59
So that's basically how we got started with that.
10:02
Well, I that it's, it's a fascinating story and just
10:05
fascinating like the, the story itself is a myth, like the IT
10:10
has a mythology to it. I, I love, I love the name that
10:15
you chose and how it was Icarus's father and how that it
10:20
was appropriate based on what you went through as an
10:23
experience. Now, what's really interesting
10:26
to me, Maya, is usually what what tends to happen in in Latin
10:29
America, right, is you know, you are, you succeed in your
10:34
country. You know, I'm talking from a,
10:37
from a Venezuelan's perspective, right?
10:38
You succeed in Venezuela and then, you know, the, the Mecca
10:43
of where you want to end up is Miami, right?
10:46
Like that's essentially what happens.
10:48
And I know, I know you know what I'm talking about and you see
10:51
this all the time, whether it's Brazil or you know, Colombia,
10:56
whatever you, you kind of want to end up in Miami, like that's
10:59
where you want to end up. Now what I, what I always
11:01
applaud and what I find interesting is you didn't
11:06
decide, you didn't decide you, you found success.
11:09
Like you know what I think you said it was $5.8 million in
11:12
revenue on a yearly basis. Is that correct?
11:16
So that peak it it, but still it's quite impressive.
11:21
But you decided to stay in Surina.
11:26
So you know where of course, like, you know, there's, there's
11:30
less economic opportunity. Like that's just the reality.
11:32
Like in Venezuela, there's there's especially with the
11:35
current political situation, like there's less economic
11:39
opportunities for entrepreneurs or people that want to build
11:42
businesses. Not well, not only from the
11:45
political standpoint, but also from the kind of economic
11:48
standpoint. I'm curious as to why you
11:51
decided to stand and fight. And I don't mean fight like
11:55
actually fight, but like metaphorically, because you're
11:58
choosing to build, you're you're choosing to build out in your
12:03
country, right, Which I find very, you know, I found, I find
12:07
noble. But at the same time, like, you
12:10
know, what you would see for most people is OK, you know,
12:13
I've made my money. Now it's time to move on to, you
12:17
know, it's it's time for me to move essentially.
12:20
So I'm very curious, like why did you feel so passionately
12:23
about staying in Suriname and building in Suriname despite
12:28
even you have potential. You've you've had regulatory
12:31
hurdles in the past, right? So what would be your response
12:35
to that? Well, actually, I think, you
12:40
know, that's, that is the majority of the population.
12:42
Everybody kind of sees Miami as the, you know, the US as, as the
12:46
place where you go to make your dreams happen.
12:51
But I've even, I was very fortunate to go to Oxford and
12:59
you know, I, I did an educational course there on, on
13:02
fintech and blockchain and wanted just to, to get, you
13:06
know, the right credentials and, and if, if needed more knowledge
13:11
for the exchange. And then was selected to their
13:15
fintech lab as one of the few in 2018.
13:18
So I've actually received a request to move to, to London
13:22
back then and, and start all this out of London, But I was
13:25
very adamant about developing it here just because I, I feel like
13:29
this is where the opportunity is, is because, you know, there
13:32
is a lack of infrastructure. So you're basically building
13:35
everything from scratch. You don't have those legacy
13:37
incumbents. You don't have, you know, all of
13:40
the infrastructure and all the players and intermediaries that
13:44
you already have in those established legacy markets.
13:48
And, you know, afterward I was also sent to, to MIT, to Boston
13:54
to apply there and, and, and work from there.
13:56
But I, I, I still tend to every time also in Switzerland, the
14:02
same thing. I spent a year and a half there
14:05
and it's just, you know, I, I keep coming back.
14:10
Like even if I, if I'm away for six weeks or, or once it starts
14:15
to head towards that two-month, three month time timeline, then
14:20
I start getting just very, very homesick and I just miss my
14:25
family. I just miss my home.
14:26
I miss the freedom that we have here, you know, because even in
14:30
Europe it's, it's very constricted.
14:32
I, I do feel like there is a rule or a regulation or a law
14:36
for everything, which does make, you know, life is very
14:41
structured there. But it, I feel like you, you,
14:45
you don't work to live, you live to work, you know, and whereas
14:51
here you, you can kind of just live.
14:54
And, and I think just to give you an idea, something that is
14:58
very uncommon or that something that surprised most of the
15:02
people that have come here from, from Europe or other countries
15:06
and visited my home. You know, they just say that
15:09
this is unknown, like people coming in and out, my friends
15:12
coming in and out or family coming in and out, people just
15:15
stopping by for lunch, US sitting all here on the patio at
15:19
night. It's just, it's very, it's a
15:23
very entrenched community where you're just kind of social all
15:26
the time. And you go to the interior on
15:29
the weekend, you drive somewhere, you go and, and relax
15:32
in a river or, you know, we go boating with our friends or you
15:36
go somewhere in the jungle and, and sit in a, in a waterfall.
15:40
And it's just, it's just a different type of life.
15:43
And I think that's so valuable here.
15:45
You know, even comparing it to Bali, for example, Bali had so
15:49
much tourists, like it was overcrowded.
15:52
All the everything was also like it was made for tourism.
15:57
Whereas here everything seems very much untouched and, you
16:02
know, evil. We, we have rural villages where
16:04
they still have traditions that are hundreds of years old and
16:08
they still live, you know, life like they did a, a couple, 100
16:11
years ago. So it's, it's, it's a different
16:15
type of life that you just can't let go.
16:17
And this country has so much natural resources, so much
16:21
potential. The like the people are so nice.
16:25
People are so genuinely nice. And just like they'll invite you
16:29
into their home for, you know, for dinner, just being a, a, a
16:32
visitor. So people here are just, I don't
16:37
know, they deserve it. I, I feel like this country
16:40
deserves it. The country deserves to be, you
16:43
know, developed for them to have the same economic opportunities,
16:46
or at least, you know, a, a normal standard of living, like
16:51
with proper healthcare, with, with good education, with
16:55
economic opportunity. And it's also such a small
16:58
population, 600,000 people, you know, I feel, and we're very
17:01
similar to Singapore logistically, economic, I'm
17:07
sorry, cultural melting pot of, you know, diversity of people
17:11
without the, the, the, you know, the amount of racism that you,
17:14
that you have there. So I, I just, I have to, I, I
17:19
can't, I can't go to, I, I can't do this in Switzerland.
17:22
I can't do this anywhere else in the world.
17:23
It needs to be done here. It needs to be at home and and
17:27
no, it just kind of reminds me of it.
17:29
It it sounds like very like the culture sounds very Hispanic,
17:33
like very family orientated, very social.
17:37
And when you're talking about like going to the waterfall, it
17:39
reminds me of there's this National Park in Venezuela.
17:42
We used to go with my family called Ganaima where like Salto
17:45
Angeles, where the the largest waterfall in the world.
17:49
And you know, they have the like those very like those plateaus
17:53
that go like into the sky. If you ever watch that movie
17:56
with what was it called the, the one with the balloon and the old
18:00
guy, like that's they, they, they, a lot of the inspiration
18:03
from that movie came from that National Park in Venezuela.
18:07
And I, I just, when you talk about the waterfall, when you
18:09
talk about the outdoors, I know I in that specific part of the
18:13
world, I know what you're referring to and it is
18:15
absolutely beautiful. It's extremely unique and it is
18:20
quite special. Like you, you know, at least in
18:22
my case, you see that like literally the monkeys going
18:25
around, like the beautiful, the, the parrots and, and all that
18:28
stuff. And it's incredibly unique and
18:30
it's incredibly special. So yeah, there's no place like
18:34
home. And that's it's very, you know,
18:36
it's very admirable that that you decided that you need to
18:40
essentially plant the flag, stay there and help build out this
18:44
infrastructure. And that's kind of where I want
18:47
to lead the conversation is like, what is the current
18:50
infrastructure like state right now in, in, in Syria now?
18:54
Like what needs to be done? Like what is like, what is the
18:58
Internet connectivity like? What is like, what's the
19:01
infrastructure like? Like what you know, how much
19:05
work needs to be done and what can you do as a as a single
19:08
entrepreneur building a company there to move the country
19:12
forward in a better direction? Yeah.
19:14
So we have about 80% mobile penetration. 80 you said 8080.
19:20
Yeah. Can I ask you something?
19:22
Is it very similar to what happened in Africa where they
19:24
skipped the landlines completely and they they built out the
19:27
mobile towers? No, no, no, we have, we actually
19:30
have landlines everywhere, but they rapidly expanded mobile
19:35
towers. And it's, it's, you know, we're
19:37
the, I think the least the country in the world with the
19:42
least dense, dense population density.
19:47
Like it's, it's 600,000 people in a very small city.
19:52
We don't have skyscrapers. It's everybody has their own
19:55
yard. We don't have apartment
19:56
buildings, you know, like the big apartment buildings like you
19:59
have in other countries. We basically just have,
20:03
everybody has their own plot of land.
20:04
Everybody has their home on it. And it's, it's a very small
20:08
footprint. If you look on it, you know, you
20:10
look at it on Google Maps, you'll see like there's this
20:13
tiny little piece of the country that's only developed or built
20:17
on. We're 93% forested, so 93
20:20
percent is Amazon rainforest. So it makes it pretty easy to
20:25
get cell phone coverage in just, you know, those areas.
20:28
And then the government had a program to put cell phone towers
20:32
in, in other rural villages in, in, in the country.
20:36
So we have broad cell phone coverage and that that makes it
20:39
easier for people to to connect on Internet.
20:42
So in terms of Internet connectivity, we're actually
20:46
pretty doing pretty well. It's unfortunate they they
20:49
chased off Starlink. Otherwise it would be easier
20:52
for, you know, some remote areas to still have access to high
20:56
speed Internet. But on average it's it's it's
21:00
fairly stable here. It's just for some reason my
21:04
house, sometimes it gets a bit glitchy here and there or it
21:09
gets a little bit unstable. But you'd say maybe once every,
21:14
you know, once it starts really raining, then you might get some
21:17
connectivity issues. So, and, and let me let me ask
21:21
you about this. So what about what's the like
21:24
central bank situation there? Does the current, does the
21:28
country issue its own currency? Is it fiscally responsible?
21:33
What is this? I I don't know if you can answer
21:34
this question, but like what is the state of the current
21:38
government of Surrey now? So I actually worked, you know,
21:43
I when I was developing the capital market, developing the
21:47
national Stock Exchange of the country, I reached out to the
21:51
central bank governor and told him he was an ex Goldman backs
21:56
ex Goldman Sachs banker. So he had experience with
22:00
capital markets. So I laid out the plan.
22:02
I said, you know, Bitcoin, this is decentralized money on the
22:06
Internet. Like this is this is going to be
22:09
our future money. This is going to be the the
22:12
layer of money on top of the Internet and everybody will be
22:16
transacting on it. Because if you look at the
22:17
centralization that's going to happen with bricks and just, you
22:21
know that the battle against the US dollar and we're very
22:24
dependent on the dollar or on the euro.
22:27
So we're very dependent on other economies, other countries for
22:30
our own economy and started working very closely with him.
22:34
And then I, I saw basically the insides of the bank as well.
22:38
And the problem, the problems that the bank had or has.
22:43
So they issue their own currency, SRD.
22:47
It's the third currency that that we've had in our 50 year
22:49
existence. So they've already scrapped
22:52
zeros, they've already changed the currency.
22:56
And basically it's it, they're kind of like a wallet for the
23:00
government because they don't really function as a central
23:03
bank should. They don't have like, for
23:07
example, a liquid fixed market. You know, it's, it's also an
23:12
Excel sheet and it's, how do you say it is failing?
23:17
It's like a system where the banks kind of say what they want
23:24
to pay for and then then it gets noted in the next sell sheet.
23:27
It's, it's completely ludicrous, but basically that's how our our
23:32
FX market is, is currently functioning.
23:37
Can I, can I frame it this way? It sounds like a very similar
23:41
story. The central Bank of Suriname is
23:44
essentially holding the population hostage.
23:47
And essentially like that's what I'm saying, that's what I'm
23:50
seeing. And of course, Bitcoin is the
23:53
solution to this. You are running for office.
23:56
I'm starting to put the pieces together.
23:59
If you get elected and first of all what, what office are you
24:03
running for? I'm running for president.
24:06
You're running for president. Oh my God, I love the BJ.
24:09
Ditcher is the goat. OK, so you are running for
24:12
president. OK, so if you get elected
24:16
president of Surinam, do you vow right now on Simply Bitcoin to
24:20
make Bitcoin legal tender in Surinam and free the people
24:25
Surinam from the tyranny of central banking?
24:27
Well, I, I've already vowed that, but basically as a, as a
24:31
maxi, that is like, you know, my own dream.
24:34
But I I actually vow to take it a step further and work toward
24:37
making it the unit of account so that people actually live on
24:41
Bitcoin and earn their salaries in Bitcoin and that is the unit
24:44
of account to what they earn. Our population is small enough,
24:47
our economy is small enough. It is actually implementable
24:50
here, especially with the natural resources that we have.
24:53
We don't have a developed capital market.
24:54
So you know, going back to the central bank, they don't do open
24:57
market operations. All right, they started it, but
25:00
they're doing short term deposits now at a 49 interest
25:04
percent interest rate for a short term deposit compared to
25:07
89 what it was. So I have no idea what they're
25:09
doing. They have no idea how capital
25:11
markets function internally or on the back end.
25:13
They have no idea how the structures work or how to
25:16
restructure ours. So our economy is basically
25:22
dependent on what a handful of people and it's it's the most
25:26
incapable people of the country because usually people don't
25:29
want to go into politics. You know, I'm, I'm with our
25:32
party, we're actually dragging people into politics or, and not
25:37
even dragging people are volunteering that have never had
25:41
anything to do with politics. I myself would have never gone
25:45
into politics, to be honest. Like I hate government.
25:48
I've grown up in a country where you kind of hate government and
25:52
you know, just just globally, you always know that government
25:56
is always corrupt. No matter where you go in the
25:58
world, it's always corrupt. And that's why we, you know why
26:01
we fell in love with Bitcoin in the 1st place, right?
26:04
It's as you started out, it's separation of money and state.
26:08
So you need to rethink the whole model, like how is this country
26:12
going to function or how is our economy going to function when
26:16
you just erratic when we finally end the Fed, like that is the
26:19
dream, right? When or when, OK, we when the
26:22
community finally ends the Fed or it finally happens or the
26:25
dollar becomes irrelevant compared to, you know, the, the
26:29
market cap of Bitcoin. What is that world going to look
26:34
like? And I think we can be a breeding
26:36
ground for what that world, what that system actually looks like
26:41
and how it functions, because we already have a, a non
26:44
functioning central bank. We already have a, a, an economy
26:47
that is not, you know, it's, it's our economy is very much
26:52
based off of the natural, like the royalties we earn off of
26:56
natural resources where we don't produce enough 68,000 people,
27:01
10% of our population works for government, half of our working
27:05
population works for government. And that's basically just to get
27:09
votes. It's not because we need that
27:10
many people in government. So a lot of the problems that we
27:14
face here with corruption, you know, that I have faced
27:18
throughout my life, my father was murdered here because of
27:24
corruption at the largest bank in Suriname.
27:26
You know, the the Suriname Sabank, the CEO and CEO were
27:30
both both convicted for illegally wiring funds from our
27:35
accounts. And my father was murdered like
27:37
shortly after, the day after the article came out.
27:39
And that that lawsuit is like the civil lawsuit is still
27:43
ongoing. It actually went to court last
27:46
month and they put a new judge on the case to, to, to, to
27:52
decide a verdict that has no knowledge of the case
27:55
whatsoever. So now we're going to the
27:57
highest Court of Justice in the country.
27:59
And I'm talking, you know, something, something that
28:02
happened in 2001, it's over 20 years ago and our family still
28:06
has not gotten justice. And my dad went to he went to
28:10
the central bank, he went to the bank, he went to the
28:13
authorities. He went to our current
28:16
president, who was at the time the Minister of Justice in the
28:18
country to also tell him like, hey, funds are being illegally
28:22
transferred from our bank accounts.
28:25
These and these and these and these laws are what the laws are
28:29
that being broken. There's, there's suspicion of,
28:32
of money laundering and he was murdered for it when he went to
28:37
the authorities, you know, when he, he blew the whistle and it
28:42
cost Justin in, in proven transfers from our accounts at
28:46
$16.4 million. So it's, it's my entire life.
28:51
It's everybody's life here. Everybody here is tired.
28:55
My entire generation is tired. Everybody on their 40 is tired.
28:58
Older people are tired of just systemic corruption for 50
29:03
years. So it's a, it's like the perfect
29:06
place to create that new system that Satoshi enabled with
29:12
Bitcoin, right? It's going to be really hard in
29:15
the US, like even if you end the Fed, it's so systemic in the
29:19
capital markets, in the in, in banking, in the way that
29:23
politics is run. The population is so big.
29:25
It's 375 million people. And Jesus Christ, Trump just
29:29
created some D5 fucking lending, sorry, some D5 lending platform.
29:37
So you can already see the way where, where, where that's
29:40
heading, right? It's just the same, the same
29:43
thing, the same system, that same broken system.
29:47
So I think we can, we can actually here create a blueprint
29:51
for integrity, create a blueprint for transparency.
29:54
Like everybody that's joining the party needs to go through
29:57
like a transparency, due diligence, everything with, you
30:01
know, with the notary and make everything that they own, you
30:05
know, just public so that you can see what we actually have.
30:09
And if we've ever been in any, you know, trials or, or legal
30:13
issues or complexities, and we only pick people that don't have
30:18
a track record of corruption, like so every other political
30:21
party, they already have a track record of corruption and, and so
30:24
do their leaders. So in that regard, we're also,
30:28
you know, completely different, but the way we approach it is
30:31
also completely different. We have, we, we focus on
30:34
projects and doing, you know, instead of just giving people
30:37
bags of food and making them dependent.
30:40
That is what the other, other political parties do.
30:42
We we really focus on just change and bringing change here.
30:46
But I don't want to go on a monologue, so no.
30:48
No, no, it's, it's great. And and don't, don't apologize
30:52
whatsoever. You feel very passionate about
30:54
this and I'm sorry to hear about, I'm sorry to hear about,
30:56
I'm sorry to hear about your father.
30:59
But obviously, you know, the way that I'm seeing it from my
31:02
perspective is I think you, you know, things happen for a
31:07
reason. And I think that you have been
31:10
uniquely positioned based on your life experiences to
31:14
effectuate change in your country.
31:16
And I think that you're seeing Bitcoin as a tool to do this
31:20
with. And what you're, you're talking
31:23
about corruption. And this is something that is
31:25
rampant in Latin America. Like this isn't just a situation
31:29
that you see in Syria. Now this happened in Venezuela,
31:32
every single country. It's, it's, it's a, it's a
31:34
rampant problem. And I would even say that it's
31:37
very rampant in the United States as well.
31:39
But I think that the reason that they're able to get away with it
31:42
is because they're the world's reserve of currency.
31:44
And unlike every other country, you know, they can print
31:47
unlimited amounts of money. But because every central bank
31:50
around the world is holding dollars, they kind of, you know,
31:53
can export that. Like, they can kind of get away
31:55
with it, so to speak. But there's still consequences
31:59
to that. And I think, you know,
32:00
specifically with Suriname, what's really interesting when
32:04
you were talking about all this, it's a very small population, 50
32:09
years of dealing with BS it, it kind of reminds me of El
32:12
Salvador. Naimbu.
32:14
Kelle's party is called Nueva Sedeas, which translates to new
32:18
ideas. I think people were sick and
32:20
tired of the whole, you know, the traditional political
32:24
parties. It seems like to me, just based
32:27
on what you're telling me Maya is, it's a very similar
32:31
situation. I think people are sick and
32:32
tired. They want a solution.
32:35
They see the corruption happening in 4K right in front
32:38
of them. And Bitcoin is that tool.
32:41
And I love the way that Naim Buchele approached this, where
32:45
he made the country's reserves public.
32:48
And what I love about that is you can't really skim off.
32:53
You skim some off the top, if you know what I mean.
32:56
If it's on an open Ledger and everyone is seeing that the
33:01
balance is increasing by one Bitcoin.
33:03
And what happens if all of a sudden there's 10 bitcoins
33:06
missing? Someone's going to be like, OK,
33:08
someone must have taken some, right?
33:10
So, yeah, I think the transparency, I think the fact
33:14
that you can't create it for free, I think it, it adds a
33:19
level. It, it, it, it, it essentially
33:22
becomes a forcing function in a way where you now have a society
33:27
whose base layer is built on uncorruptible money.
33:31
And I think a lot of the world's problems stem from the fact that
33:35
a lot of the countries all around the world, including
33:38
Suriname, the the base layer of society is based on a corrupt
33:41
it, it's corrupted, right? And it allows this this, this
33:46
capital misallocation, this theft.
33:49
But I'm so happy that you're in this position and you, you felt
33:53
like you, you have the ability and you have the drive to really
33:59
put yourself on the line. Because now you're talking to me
34:02
about safe, like, you know, things that have happened to
34:05
your family. Like I'm sure that you feel this
34:09
too, Like this is this is something bigger than yourself.
34:11
Like you're putting yourself out in the like you're putting out,
34:14
you're putting yourself in the field of fire, you know, because
34:18
you want to effectuate change for your country.
34:21
And now my question to you is, how have people received it?
34:25
Like, you know, in in the US, for example, it's a two party
34:28
system. It's incredibly difficult to run
34:31
as a third party. It's it's basically impossible.
34:34
Shout out to RFK for doing as much as he could.
34:37
Eventually he's like, you know what, I'm just going to get
34:39
behind Trump. But it's essentially, you know,
34:41
you either run as a Republican, you either run as a Democrat.
34:44
I'm not really familiar with the political situation, Sir.
34:47
And I'm, could you explain that to everyone?
34:49
Like, what's it like? Do you have a possibility of
34:52
winning? Is this an uphill battle?
34:55
So it's a multi party system. So you have an coalition and an
35:01
opposition. And depending on how many seats
35:03
you earn, that determines whether you're, you know,
35:06
whether you end up in coalition or in the oppositional seats.
35:10
And you need a 26 seat majority to, you know, have an influence
35:17
on our select A president, for example.
35:21
So there are two large parties or the two largest parties.
35:27
Parties are the National Democratic Party and the FIAPI,
35:32
which is our current government. Then you also have a little
35:37
little bit smaller ABOP, which is our current Vice president.
35:41
He's on the Interpol list, by the way, So I'll be running up
35:44
against him as well. But basically every party has
35:49
equal odds towards the elections.
35:52
So it depends on how many votes you get.
35:55
How many votes your party gets determines how many seats you
36:00
get. And one seat is about around
36:02
5000 votes right now. And they just changed our
36:07
constitution and then our voting laws to make it fairer.
36:12
So now we have one man one vote. So parties would in, in the
36:17
past, they would manipulate, you know, they would go to like
36:21
remote villages or where they would go to a remote district
36:25
where you only have 1300 people living or 3000 people living.
36:29
And then they would get like 3 or 4 seats from that district
36:33
just by convincing that small amount of people.
36:36
Now it's 191 vote So and the majority of the people live in
36:39
the city. So that gives us equal odds.
36:42
Also, a lot of the voters are young and we have a lot of new
36:47
like first time voters as well. So about 4040% of voters and
36:52
we've calculated and gives us about 22 seats just targeting
36:56
that younger generation. And that generation is, you
36:59
know, they do want change. And these older political
37:03
parties, if you look at the NDP, for example, they had our former
37:06
dictator, you know, the president who's also on, on, I'm
37:11
not sure if he's on the Interpol list, but he has definitely been
37:14
convicted of, of, you know, drug trafficking in, in the
37:16
Netherlands and is wanted same as our current vice president.
37:21
So you have systemic corrupt people in their leadership and
37:28
people that have already had convictions or people that have
37:31
already been, you know, in government and have been shown
37:35
to be systemically corrupt, like very, very corrupt.
37:39
So people don't haven't had an an actual alternative in, in,
37:45
you know, to vote because it's always been these two large
37:48
parties and people like myself and others that have joined,
37:51
they would never go into politics.
37:53
But everybody feels like, especially in the last four
37:57
years, our country has gone like, the economy has gone to
38:01
shit, healthcare has gone to shit, education is, is
38:05
everything is moving backwards. You know, 3 infants just died
38:10
because there's a lack of staff and lack of material.
38:13
At our main hospital, the cardio department just had to close.
38:17
So if you have a kid, the NICU is closed.
38:20
If you have a heart problem, you need to go to another hospital
38:23
or you need to fly somewhere else.
38:25
So the, the problems have gotten so bad that even hospital staff
38:30
started protesting, you know, in the past week.
38:33
So, and that's the first time that has that has ever happened
38:36
because hospital staff usually don't protest because they're,
38:39
so, you know, they're, they're core to the healthcare system.
38:43
So they've just started protesting.
38:45
Everybody's tired and they need an alternative, but they don't
38:48
have a good alternative. And it, it's it, it all boils
38:53
down to what me and my team, because it's a team effort, it's
38:57
multi party. If you know, if one of the it's
39:00
an Bitcoin as legal tender and the issuances of shares and all
39:04
that, that's in our party manifesto.
39:06
So it's it's you know, it's going to be implemented
39:09
regardless. But we operate as a team and our
39:13
goal is to develop this country and to save this country from,
39:17
you know, after these elections, we're going to turn into
39:21
Venezuela because we're we're getting oil royalties to the
39:25
tune of 2.8 billion from our first well, starting in 2028.
39:30
So whatever government comes to power now, they'll have the
39:33
opportunity to also pawn that off, just like the other
39:36
royalties and what they've already done with it.
39:39
And this country will, you know, the situation will get even
39:41
worse. So we have to win in these
39:44
elections just to prevent these corrupt people from siphoning
39:49
and stealing everything. Absolutely.
39:52
And when is the election? And my second question is, and
39:56
we've seen this in Venezuela, right?
39:57
I don't know how how much I could talk about this on
39:59
YouTube, but let's just say that the the previous elections in
40:04
Venezuela, a lot of people had questions about them.
40:07
How is the election system in Suriname?
40:10
Is it something that people feel like they can depend on?
40:14
And when is the election itself? Yeah.
40:17
So it's not as, so you don't have the situation that you have
40:22
in Venezuela here, which is we're very fortunate that we
40:26
haven't had those kind of issues.
40:28
They do allow foreign, you know, foreign officials to come and
40:33
check the elections and check, check the way that elections are
40:36
progressing and be a part of, of the counting and, and, and the
40:39
ballot system. And we've actually during the
40:42
last elections had civilians go out and guard ballots because
40:48
they were afraid that the NDP, the, the National Democratic
40:52
Party, they were afraid that they were going to go there and
40:55
burn them. So you had civil civilians like
40:58
surrounding ballots just to make sure that nobody could access
41:02
them. Is that the party currently in
41:05
power? No former former government.
41:08
Former former government, what so and then is, does it work
41:11
like a parliamentary system where essentially like you
41:17
become Prime Minister if you're, you know, if, if you, if you're
41:21
able to get a, a, a government majority, is it similar to that
41:25
or is it more like the US system?
41:28
No, basically it's a parliamentary system where if
41:30
you have the majority seats, basically you have the the most
41:34
leverage to determine who becomes the presidential
41:37
candidate. And you know, even within our
41:40
team, if someone, if one of us performs better than I do, then
41:46
that is the better candidate, right?
41:48
That that's the, the person that is better suited for the role.
41:51
So it, it really depends on how we like, I'm not like this is
41:57
not my life's passion to become the country's president.
42:01
I want to implement change. I want to make sure that change
42:04
happens. And as long as we as a party and
42:06
our name is 597 is the country code.
42:09
So as long as us, as we as a team win enough seats, the
42:16
person that is right for the job will have that driver's seat.
42:19
And we'll make this change happen regardless of whether I'm
42:23
in that driver's seat or not. And the goal is actually even
42:26
if, you know, because I am the candidate within our party, but
42:30
still, even if like, for example, I do become president,
42:36
which our odds are looking very good, my goal is to make it make
42:41
myself irrelevant, right? Like they said, Bill Gates said,
42:47
not not a fan of him currently, but you know, he said that he
42:51
would find a lazy person to do a hard job because they'd find an
42:54
easy way to do it. I think if you figure out how to
43:00
make government more efficient, how to privatize industries and
43:05
sectors and reduce government overreach into people's lives,
43:08
give, give the free market an opportunity to actually be a
43:12
free market and rein and create the foundation and, and, and
43:16
the, the environment for people and the private sector to
43:20
thrive, then I don't think that you need, you know, a face to
43:24
lead the country. To be honest.
43:26
I, I maybe in relation to, you know, Foreign Relations, other,
43:31
other countries, but we're, we're very isolated.
43:33
I think honestly, I don't know why, why our president travels
43:37
as much as he does because he's just like, he should have rather
43:40
given that money to healthcare, to be honest.
43:42
This this country can be run a lot more efficiently.
43:47
And when is the? When is the election
43:48
specifically? May next year.
43:51
In May next year. OK.
43:53
And how many you said how you said your party specifically if
43:57
you focus on the the youth vote would be guaranteed 22 seats.
44:01
How many seats in total? 51. 51 See Oh so basically
44:06
almost a majority. Would you need any type of
44:09
coalition government or could your party win it outright?
44:13
Well, if you win, if you win enough seats, then you just form
44:18
a coalition government with your within your, with your own
44:21
party. You don't have to, you don't
44:22
have to form a coalition with other parties.
44:24
It's just your, your candidates basically in the coalition.
44:29
And then the other parties would be in the opposition and
44:32
depending on because it's, it's at this point, it's funding,
44:36
right? It's it's funding, it's how we
44:39
spend funding. And we want to be very
44:41
transparent about how we spend funding as well.
44:43
We have broad support here from the private sector, which is
44:47
increasing as we, you know, as we release more who are our team
44:51
members are, who is actually behind the party, who's actually
44:56
running and our manifesto, for example, like we've, we've
45:01
gotten buildings offered where the, where we're going to have
45:04
the party center and like in the heart of the city billboards
45:09
and, and that creates exposure. But every candidate is working
45:14
on projects to fix issues in this country right now.
45:17
So that is what we're focusing on fixing, fixing problems in
45:21
the country right now. So that's where our campaign
45:24
funding goes to toward solving actual problems for, for these
45:29
people in their, you know, in their community, in their area
45:32
or country, nationwide. And on average, you know, some
45:38
like some, some parties have raised or like one party I think
45:42
raised 300K. The two larger parties I've
45:45
heard had around two and a half million, $3,000,000.
45:48
So that's about what you need in capital to, you know, have a
45:53
have a good shot at the elections.
45:55
But we're being very smart about how we how we market our social
45:59
media strategy and, and basically just the strategy for,
46:04
for how, how we show that we're different than the existing
46:10
political parties and existing politicians.
46:13
And I think that will make, you know, especially the difference
46:16
for for the average voter that just is they're, they're either,
46:21
you know, like in the US, they vote against a party, not for a
46:25
particular party always, right? It's usually you, you're voting
46:28
against one. And here it's always voting
46:32
against the current government. How?
46:34
How long are the terms? So if you like, if you get a
46:38
majority in parliament and you get nominated as Prime Minister,
46:43
president, president, how long is the term?
46:50
Five year term. Five year term and then how do
46:54
you ensure so does this mean that you're going to be ending
46:58
the local Fiat currency? And my follow up question to
47:02
that is, you know, it from a, from an infrastructure
47:07
perspective, I think that Bitcoin on chain is, in my
47:13
opinion, the next 5-10 years is going to be like outside the,
47:20
the ability for the average person around the world to be
47:23
spending money on chains, specifically for smaller
47:26
transactions. I think that's, I'm very
47:28
optimistic on Fetimen, I'm very optimistic on lightning.
47:33
But how do you, how do you plan to tackle that?
47:35
Because that is, that is a, you know, that is a like, is the
47:40
whole country going to be running a wallet of Satoshi?
47:44
You know, like, how do you, how do you plan to tackle that?
47:47
Of course, Naibu Kelly had his approach with Chivo.
47:50
I remember when I went to El Salvador, I took it upon myself
47:54
to, to essentially ask the population like, you know, using
48:00
Bitcoin and the vast majority of people.
48:04
And I'm pretty confident it's probably the same case just
48:08
because I know how popular the the dollar is in Venezuela, for
48:11
example, the, the vast majority of people were just like, give
48:16
me a give me dollars. And you know, the, the like the
48:21
official hotels and like the big chains, they all accepted
48:25
Bitcoin and you could play with lightning and it was phenomenal.
48:28
But the everyday person, which I spent a lot of time just
48:32
conversing with, they were just like, yeah, this Bitcoin thing
48:36
is cool, but like, pay me in dollars, right?
48:40
I'm assuming Suriname is dollarized so.
48:44
You have a economy, but a lot of people do transact and save in
48:50
in the dollar, yes. And so it's it's, I think that
48:54
like it's just like, OK, you make Bitcoin legal tender, but
48:59
does that mean you're getting rid of the local Fiat current?
49:02
There's an educational component, there is an
49:05
infrastructure component to it. I'm sure that like the Bitcoin
49:08
community would let's just jump in there and try to, you know,
49:12
help this and tackle this issue. But what's your what's your plan
49:16
there specifically for like lower payments?
49:18
I get it. Like if it's in your savings and
49:20
you have Bitcoin and cold storage, you know, write down
49:23
the words and this and that. But for everyday payments, like
49:27
what would you do? Because it still needs to be
49:29
built out. Yeah.
49:30
So, you know, I think in terms of scalability and if you're
49:37
talking about smaller transactions, you know,
49:40
lightning has been improving I think rapidly over over the last
49:45
year. I'm a big fan of, of O VS 2 and
49:50
the protocol. So it's and and there, you know,
49:55
you have you have few things that are still a bit early, but
49:59
also interesting, like, you know, E Cashman's Cashew things
50:05
that are being built on top of Noster incorporating both
50:08
liquid, both lightning. You have tapered assets that
50:13
just came out after their, you know, major legal battle about
50:16
the name. So I see those as opportunities
50:21
to, to make it cheaper for people to transact.
50:25
But we could also have, you know, for example, an, an, an
50:29
interim or a transition to, you know, full living on sets or a
50:35
combination of people being able to live on sets and having an,
50:39
an, an, a fetty mint or, or a heat catchment.
50:42
And I feel like we shouldn't impose like a specific wallet on
50:49
the population like Chico or like what Miguela did in El
50:53
Salvador. I feel like people should be
50:55
free to, to choose. So I still think that
50:59
maintaining, I think freedom should be more important than
51:03
Bitcoin adoption. Because, you know, 111 is, is,
51:06
is is always supporting the other.
51:09
So whether you, you educate them on self custody and they decide
51:14
to self custody or you have Blink, Waller, Satoshi, Aqua or
51:18
whatever wallet that people can use here, they will adopt what
51:22
they think is best for their situation, right?
51:27
And I mean, we can work on, on easier solutions.
51:30
We can work on, for example, giving Blink more like I, I
51:35
asked them for, for NFCI asked them to, to integrate SRD into
51:40
the wallet. You know, several things that,
51:43
that made it easier for us to, to, to do grassroots adoption
51:48
here. So you kind of see what works
51:51
and what doesn't work. But I think if you have a unique
51:55
use case, because I do think that innovation happens in
51:59
environments where you know, you have unique use cases where
52:02
these things are actually needed.
52:03
If you look at Machankura, if you look at M PESA and in in
52:08
Africa and how that scaled, I think use cases build products.
52:12
So if you have a country where Fiat rails are a nightmare,
52:18
where you don't have any payment rails internationally, like
52:22
websites don't have online payments currently, it's it's
52:25
everything is is still hard to do you create solutions for
52:30
that, right? And if you have leadership that
52:33
doesn't want a commercial solution, like, for example,
52:36
achievable, but wants something that actually works for their
52:39
population and it makes it easier for them to transact and
52:42
increases their level of freedom, like, for example,
52:45
empowering Noster, right? Because Noster adds an extra
52:50
layer of decentralization on what is traditional Internet.
52:54
You know what we know as Web 2. Noster enables us to build like,
52:58
yeah, Jack Dorsey named it Web 5, Web 10.
53:00
I don't care at this point what you want to name it, but it's
53:03
replacing old infrastructure. So if you put the, if we put the
53:10
focus on building on free and open source protocols and
53:14
building on an open standard and making it the People's Choice
53:19
and, and, and making their, their freedom a priority, you
53:22
know, and not centralization, then I think that will in itself
53:26
create an environment where startups pop up or where, you
53:29
know, where, where innovation heads and is developed in a
53:33
certain way that it actually enables, you know, these faster
53:37
rails And something that that gets developed for here or gets
53:41
gets improved for here might be beneficial to the, the rest of
53:45
the world, right, because it benefits the whole ecosystem.
53:48
That's the beauty of open source development, especially in the
53:50
Bitcoin community. It benefits everyone.
53:53
So if we start building that new system and we build it
53:55
collaboratively, we build, you know, not like in in El Salvador
54:00
where everything was kind of like centralized and, and still
54:03
a small community, but you build it just with the entire
54:05
community. We open it up and you say, hey,
54:08
we need this and this and this and this.
54:10
And these are the problems we need to tackle in healthcare.
54:13
This is the problem we need to tackle in education.
54:15
This is the problem we need to tackle in infrastructure and we
54:20
direct our sovereign wealth fund and our resources towards
54:24
stimulating that and build the regulatory framework around it
54:29
as well to protect people's freedoms, to protect, you know
54:32
that to to protect them from government overreach, but which
54:35
has so systemically grown in other countries and other
54:38
regions. I think that creates an
54:39
environment that is unknown globally and that can give us a
54:43
competitive advantage and hopefully a better competitive
54:47
advantage. And that's all better.
54:48
Not that it's a competition with naive, but still.
54:52
Yeah, I mean, and I think that's kind of like it goes down to the
54:54
theory from the sovereign individual, right, where you
54:56
have different jurisdictions competing for Bitcoiners and
55:00
entrepreneurs to to come to those jurisdictions.
55:03
And it seems like if you were to get elected president, that's
55:07
essentially the environment that you want to foster.
55:11
Now. My, my, my question to you is
55:14
like what I'm seeing and, and, and you're taking a, a free
55:17
market approach, which I love because I'm a free market maxi
55:19
myself. And what I'm seeing in most
55:23
countries is, you know, as a Bitcoiner, you'd be like this
55:27
massive Bitcoin adoption happening globally, which I
55:30
think it is happening. But what I'm seeing specifically
55:34
Venezuela, Argentina, you know, countries in Africa, you're
55:38
seeing really the adoption of alternative digital, digital
55:43
alternative assets, but most specifically stable coins.
55:46
So I'm seeing like massive adoption.
55:50
Like people really love Tether. People really love, you know,
55:54
the because it kind of gives them the like the, the illusion
55:59
that they're holding something stable, but compared to their
56:02
local currency, it's actually extremely stable.
56:05
So I'm seeing like a lot of adoption in tether and those are
56:10
free market forces that are, that are doing that.
56:13
It's not being pushed by a politician or it, it isn't a
56:18
certain agenda. It's just people seem to just
56:21
want to hold the dollar equivalents in the digital form.
56:28
And if you're advocating for making Bitcoin legal tender,
56:30
like again, I think that there's such an educational thing that
56:35
needs to happen as well. It's not as simple as just
56:38
making it legal tender. And you know, I think over the
56:42
years maybe it starts to happen. I think there needs to be an
56:45
educational component where people need to be taught the
56:49
benefits of sound money. Because I think you and I could
56:52
both agree that the reason that a lot of these countries, you
56:56
know, a lot of these developing countries, specifically the
56:59
countries that we're from, I think that a lot of the reasons
57:01
as to why they're in the situations that they're in today
57:06
is because the younger generations weren't educated.
57:09
They didn't feel like they had an opportunity.
57:11
So they had to resort to crime, they had to resort to
57:13
corruption. They have to resort to these
57:15
things in order to feel like they can get ahead it.
57:18
It never really created an environment where you felt like,
57:22
you know, in the United States, it's not like this anymore.
57:25
But you were sold this idea of if you work hard enough and you
57:30
believe and you put your head down and you get to work, you
57:34
can live the American dream. That's essentially what we've
57:36
been sold, right? And, you know, our country's
57:40
like, it's not the case at all, right?
57:44
So I think there's an educational component.
57:46
I think the younger generations need to be brought up to speed
57:50
on that. This I think just by making
57:53
Bitcoin legal tender, I think it's a great start, but I think
57:57
that there's all these other things that need to happen at
58:00
the same time. I think, I think unit of account
58:03
is very important. You know, having your salary be
58:07
in SAT's and not a Fiat value of SAT's, but basically based off
58:13
of just this is what you earn in sets.
58:17
This is your salary, It's in the contract, it's in sets.
58:20
You get paid in sets every month when you go grocery shopping to
58:24
the store, the prices are in sets.
58:26
Or when, you know, if we, if we, for example, implemented as a
58:30
pilot, because we're going to have to, you know, I'm going to,
58:34
I can be a one person Maxi army here saying like, OK, or like a
58:37
dictator, OK, we're going to just change everything to to
58:41
sets and we're going to have to have advisors here.
58:44
That and, and you know, people from, from the industry that can
58:48
actually talk about this and, and where we can test it in a
58:53
safe environment and see how that functions.
58:55
But I think that's where you you create that opportunity.
58:58
Like for example, we have rural villages here where they can't
59:01
use SRD right now, like if it costs them more to travel to the
59:05
city to use the SRD than what they earn in like a month or
59:09
three months. So these environments are
59:13
perfect for if you create or actually they already have solar
59:18
grid. So if you, for example, increase
59:20
the capacity of these solar grids, we have a couple of
59:22
villages where they already want to implement this.
59:24
You increase the capacity of the solar grids, add mining, a
59:28
mining component to it that earns a basically an income or
59:33
like a little sovereign wealth and a little treasury for that
59:37
village. Those villagers don't have a
59:39
source of income right now, right?
59:41
And everybody, for example, starts earning in SAS.
59:45
You start creating opportunity, economic opportunity for them,
59:49
sustainable economic opportunity.
59:50
There are several really great projects happening on the
59:53
ground, you know, not Bitcoin related, but just production
59:59
based off of what they're naturally already producing and
1:00:02
they earn in SAT. So now you have an actually like
1:00:05
mini economy running on SAT's and then scale it up
1:00:10
countrywide. We're small enough, 600,000
1:00:13
people, we have enough natural resources, we can actually issue
1:00:17
a bond to develop our, you know, 900 MW.
1:00:22
It was initially. Estimated at 450 to 650 MW, now
1:00:27
900 and something MW capacity. You develop that with a Bitcoin
1:00:31
bond. You then use that energy to mine
1:00:35
Bitcoin. You create an addition to the
1:00:37
sovereign wealth fund that's not coming from oil royalties, it's
1:00:40
coming from directly from energy, converting energy into
1:00:45
into Bitcoin. People's salaries can actually
1:00:48
be denominated in Bitcoin. Then there's no relation to Fiat
1:00:53
anymore, right? Then they'll see their savings,
1:00:56
their salaries, they'll see it increase or decrease based off
1:01:01
of the comparing it to a Fiat value.
1:01:05
But when they go to the store, when they get their salary, one
1:01:08
Bitcoin is one Bitcoin, one set is one set, right?
1:01:12
So I think that's yeah, I think that's where that mind shift
1:01:15
will happen. And I think that is necessary.
1:01:17
And I think it's harder to implement in a country where you
1:01:20
have, you know, 6 million people or where you have 375 million
1:01:24
people in comparison to the country where you have, you
1:01:27
know, 240,000 odd something people living in in the city and
1:01:32
600,000 people all throughout the country.
1:01:34
So I think this can be like a little fire that lights up and
1:01:39
then just infects the rest of the world.
1:01:43
That is, yeah. And it's, it's, it's makes me
1:01:48
very, very optimistic and bullish about the future of
1:01:51
Suriname and very noble what you're doing.
1:01:55
And I applaud you for that. And you know, this is I my, my
1:02:02
intuition tells me that, you know, the the best is yet to
1:02:05
come as it relates to this. And I do wish you all the best
1:02:08
in your election of of May next year.
1:02:11
And if people want to donate or support you or keep up with this
1:02:16
election, where can they find you?
1:02:19
Where can they find out more about the election?
1:02:21
Where can they find out more about the campaign?
1:02:24
Yeah, so they can first and foremost find me on Auster, you
1:02:29
know, or find me on X My Empire 25.
1:02:34
We have a Suriname adoption campaign running on geyser fund,
1:02:40
which is where how all the grassroots projects are
1:02:44
currently funded aside from, you know, a grand that they recently
1:02:47
got from Bitcoin Beach. But basically that's where, you
1:02:51
know, paying them salaries. They they go out and do merchant
1:02:55
onboarding every day. Today they had another five
1:02:57
people. So it's beautiful to see that
1:02:59
it's actually like increasing by 5 by 6 by sometimes too, but
1:03:04
it's increasing day by day. So you can find Sternum Bitcoin
1:03:08
adoption on on geyser. And we'll be launching our
1:03:12
campaign with website over the next week where you'll see the
1:03:18
ability to donate in Bitcoin and lightning.
1:03:21
So that's that's going live in in a week or two.
1:03:24
And then you can also read the manifesto and and see Bitcoin as
1:03:28
legal tender and what we intend to do aside from just making it
1:03:32
legal tender in there as well. Awesome.
1:03:35
Well, I highly enjoyed this conversation and you know, I, I
1:03:40
wish you all the best of luck. I think this is an incredibly
1:03:42
important election for your country and I'm going to be
1:03:46
staying tuned and seeing what what happens.
1:03:48
And I, I'm, I'm so excited to, to see what, you know, the, I'm
1:03:53
so excited to see the future of Suriname, especially if you get
1:03:56
elected and, and you know what, the country, where the country
1:04:00
is going to head on a, on a Bitcoin standard, you know, and
1:04:04
things tend to prosper when they're on a Bitcoin standard.
1:04:07
So I'm incredibly excited. Anyways, Maya, it's been an
1:04:11
honour to have you on the show. Thank you so much for joining us
1:04:13
today. I appreciate it.
1:04:15
Likewise, thank you for having me.
1:04:18
All right guys, that was our interview.
1:04:19
If you guys enjoyed the show and you want to do smash the like
1:04:21
button, consider subscribing if you feel like we provided you
1:04:23
value, we'll see you tomorrow on the live show, 12:15 PM Eastern
1:04:27
Standard Time. Until then, love you all to see
1:04:29
you guys later. Peace out.
1:04:32
It was brought to you by bitcoinwell.com on a mission to
1:04:35
enable independence.