Dec. 1995 and Jan. 1996 Panama News Briefs

Tension Over Indigenous Land Rights

Tension over land rights led to human rights violations in the western province of Chiriquí, according to José Mendoza, former coordinator of Service for Peace and Justice (SERPAJ). Mendoza claims that pillories are being used to punish Ngobe-BuglŽ people who challenge cattle ranchers and farmers, who the indigenous people accuse of occupying their lands. SERPAJ has verified the use of pillories in several different locations across the province and says that the Chiriquí authorities are aware that local officials are imposing this iilegal punishment on indigenous poeple. If these accusations are proven, it would be a breach of the UN Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment. SERPAJ said it will present its evidence to the United Nations.

Source: Central America Human Rights Bulletin (London), 12/95.

Potential Abuses on Freedom of the Press

The Inter-American Press Society (IPS) censured President PŽrez Balladares’ government in November for restricting press freedoms, and removed Panama from the list of countries which permit total freedom of expression. Angie Azores, an executive of La Estrella de Panamá, alleged that the government was exercising economic pressure on the paper in retaliation for its decision to remove Tomás Altamirano Duque as director of the newspaper. Duque is Panama’s vice-president, but Duque’s removal and the withdrawal of government advertising from the paper, which is worth $100,000 per month. La Estrella also accuses the government of breaking aprinting contract and stalling on payment of debts worth $337,000. Pérez Balladares has a libel suit pending against La Estrella over an editorial which blamed the government for forcing the paper to fire 130 workers.

Source: Central America Human Rights Bulletin (London), 12/95.

Panama granted a 40-year concession to Evergreen, a Taiwanese transnational shipping company, to build a container port in Coco Solo Norte in Colón, but 350 families will be displaced by the port. The families protested that the Interoceanic Regional Authority wanted to sell old and deteriorated replacement homes to them at inflated prices, and promised to resist the relocation.

Colón Catholic Bishop Carlos María Ariz appealed to the government to support the residents. ÒInstead of pressuring the people of Colón, the government should be in solidarity with them,Ó he said. Bishop Ariz said that the resident have a right to benefit from the “many millions of dollars” that will be generated by the container port, which will cost $74 million to build over a year and a half. He said the great majority of families in Coco Solo Norte are prepared to leave their homes, but should be allowed to do so with dignity and at a fair price.

Sources: El Panam‡ America, 12/29/95, 1/14/96.

Call-to- Action 

Service for Peace and Justice in Panama seeks letters of support from the international community for a peasant community in Capira District whose only means of subsistence is threatened: the Land.

Since 1919 peasants from Ciri Grande in Capira have struggled for deed to the land they worked and obtained title to more than 3,000 hectares for collective use. The cooperative’s by-laws forbid sale of the land to individual buyers, so that the land passes from one generation to the next.

The coop’s legal status has been kept up to date, but since last year, Panama’s Agrarian Reform Director, Tom‡s Noriega, has ignored the community’s legal land rights. Together with local landowners who have recently entered the area, the agrarian reform agency has carried out a campaign to give individual titles to the land.

SERPAJ seeks letters to the Agrarian Reform Director requesting:

1. Recognition of the Ciri Grande Agricultural Union Society as a legally constituted organization who are sole owners of the land that is titled to them.

2. That he desist from efforts to take away the peasants in the coop’s only means of subsistence.

3. An end to the signature campaign in the area for individual title.

4. That the right to land and work being respected as universally recognized basic human rights.

Please send letters or faxes to:

Ing. Tomás Noriega

Director Reforma Agraria

República de Panamá

Fax: 011-507-232-5921

Please send copies to:

Ing. Carlos Sousa Lenox

Ministro de Desarollo Agropecuario

República de Panamá

Fax: 011-507-232-5044

Dr. Ernesto Pérez Balladares

Presidente

República de Panamá

Fax: 011-507-227-0076

Copies to the FOR would also be appreciated.