Panama Update Archives
Election Time in Panama — Many Promises
Martín Torrijos, son of former Panamanian leader General Omar Torrijos, still leads in polls as the country counts down to May 2 elections. Torrijos represents the ruling Revolutionary Democratic Party (PRD), founded by his father.
Forty-five percent of Panamanians intend to vote for Martín Torrijos, 32% for Mireya Moscoso of the Arnulfista Party, and 17.2% for Alberto Vallarino of Opposition Action, according to a Dichter & Neira national poll taken on February 27-28. Torrijos, who is 35 years old, has an even greater lead over Moscoso among young people (50.8% to 27.1%); while Moscoso has a slight lead among voters 50 years and older. Moscoso is the widow of four-time president Arnulfo Arias, who was twice thrown out of office with U.S. support.
Panama allows the election of president with only a plurality of votes, without requiring a run-off election. The current president, Ernesto Pérez Balladares, was elected in 1994 with only 33% of votes cast. In addition to the leader who will preside over the transfer of the canal to Panamanian jurisdiction, Panamanians will elect 65 legislative deputies, two vice-presidents and twenty members of the Central American Parliament.
The most important decision that the next government will have to make, according to former canal administrator Fernando Manfredo, is whether and how to build a third set of locks for the Panama Canal. The new set of locks is an idea that the United States first considered in the 1930s, and would allow the canal to increase the number of ships transiting the canal and keep up with the growth of international shipping. On that issue, Torrijos' platform says only that such a decision "would be the result of... the broadest national consultation and of the resulting consensus of the great majority of political and social forces." A tripartite commission of Panama, the United States and Japan concluded in 1993 that a third set of locks would cost from six to eight billion dollars.
The Torrijos platform acknowledges the "destabilizing effects of the international movement of capital that has caused such damage to the region," but then promises not to "impose any restrictions on the movement of capital." While Torrijos has gone on record as opposing the privatization of the state water company — a proposal that led to rioting in Panama City last December, to which the police responded brutally — his program also supports investing funds from the public treasury in the private sector.
Torrijos' program is silent on some prominent issues, including the development of gold and copper mines, which has caused intense conflict, especially in Panamanian indigenous communities, and the role of labor and labor unions. The program also says nothing about the U.S. military's departure, instead referring to the importance of "incorporating the transferred lands into national development in ways that ensure that their uses as well as benefits from their use promote the social welfare of all Panamanians, especially those most in need."
Mireya Moscoso's program, on the other hand, specifically promises to insist on the complete cleanup of the transferring military bases and firing ranges, "according to the standards used in the United States, of all explosive, chemical, biological and any other kind of contamination." She has also declared publicly her opposition to privatization of state agencies, and that she would declare a moratorium on new mining concessions. On other issues her platform is vague, proposing only to "revise" education and labor policies.
Torrijos' opponents have accused him of lying when he says he opposes privatization, since he personally signed the decree for privatizing the electric company, while his vice-presidential running mate did the same, as well as signing the decree that attempted to privatize the state water company. To dramatize their charges, opponents have run TV ads with a big "M" for "mentira," the Spanish word for "lie," which mimicked the letter and colors of Martín Torrijos' campaign logo.
In the hotly contested mayoral race in Panama City, 44% of those surveyed said they would vote for incumbent Mayín Correa in a March Gallup poll. She is supported especially by youth and low-income voters, while 32% intend to cast their ballots for Juan Carlos Navarro, who represents the ruling PRD and is supported by voters with higher education and income. Lagging behind is indepenent candidate and jurist Miguel Antonio Bernal, with 10 percent. Bernal is defending himself on libel charges by the national police chief for saying last year that the police were responsible in the murder of four inmates on Coiba penal colony.
Sources: El Panamá América 3/11, 3/27/99; La Prensa 3/7/99; Plan de Gobierno de la Alianza Nueva Nación (Torrijos); Nuestro Compromiso para el Cambio: Plan de Gobierno (Moscoso); analyses of platforms by National Movement in Defense of Sovereignty.
Fellowship of Reconciliation
Panama Campaign
Produced by the Fellowship of Reconciliation Task Force on Latin America and the Caribbean
2017 Mission St. #305, San Francisco, CA 94110
Tel: (415) 495-6334, Fax: (415) 495-5628, E-mail: forlatam@igc.apc.org
- Page created June 28, 1999.
