Turmoil in the capital

by Eric Jackson

In this corner the challengers and usual suspects... Photo by G. Vega

The week of April 30 to May 4 brought Panama City its worst public disorders in several years. The protests were formally about the increase in city bus fares from the 15¢ that had prevailed for a decade to a quarter, but for the labor unions and student activists who closed down many key city streets the 67 percent transit hike was but the latest of an accumulating pile of grievances. During the past year there has been a nominal increase in the minimum wage, with far more substantial raises in the prices of electricity and telephone services, gasoline, beer and soft drinks. Some 18,000 public sector workers have been fired since the Moscoso administration took office, to be replaced by activists from the Arnulfista party and its allies. The Moscoso administration and its allies have set up rival unions in an attempt to smash the construction workers' SUNTRACS and the public employees' FENASEP. Many taxi drivers, who had been forced to pay bribes ranging from $3,000 to $4,500 to get their permits, had their permits summarily cancelled and thus lost their means of making a living. Dozens of public schools didn't open on schedule in March due to their state of disrepair, and many others have been making do without full complements of teachers. The economy is in shambles, with many Panamanians unemployed and the government mostly in a state of denial about the situation.

And in this corner, representing the established order... Photo by G. Vega

Thus when bus fare were hiked, The United Syndicate of Construction and Similar Workers (SUNTRACS) and the main radical student groups Thought and Transforming Action (PAT) and the Revolutionary Student Front (FER-29) quickly put out a call for Panama City street protests on April 30. The battle that day took place here and there around the city, but above all on the Trans-Isthmian Highway in front of the University of Panama. Street blockades in that location are common, but on this day the usual suspects from the university were reinforced by large rock-throwing contingents of construction workers and high school students from Artes y Oficios, which is across the street from the university. A van was set afire, barricades were erected in the street, and construction workers took positions in a tall building near the intersection of the Transistmica and Tumba Muerto, throwing objects at cops and traffic below. The students from Artes y Oficios assaulted a number of individuals.

The police responded with tear gas and rubber bullets, but generally without showing much enthusiasm for a fight. Mostly they directed cars around the areas within rock-throwing distance of the protesters. At the end of the day, the university, Artes y Oficios, and the Instituto Nacional, an elite high school with a militant reputation, were ordered closed.

As a crowd largely composed of little boys from the adjacent shantytown looked on, the battle ebbed and flowed in front of the university. At this particular moment the police were forced to retreat. Photo by G. Vega

The next day was Mayday, a holiday, and some 5,000 workers, mostly members of SUNTRACS or the National Federation of Public Servants (FENASEP), marched from Plaza Porras to Plaza Cinco de Mayo behind a papier mache three-headed monster representing globalization. The speakers at the rally vowed to resist further privatizations of state-owned enterprises, particularly the IDAAN water and sewer utility and the Seguro Social public health care system.

On May 2 along the Pan-American Highway in Arraijan, the Coordinadora Victoriano Lorenzo, a coalition of leftist, labor, labor and community organizations, blocked traffic and fought with police. There the issues were not only the ones prompting protests in the capital, but also recent regulations that require buses from Panama West to go through Balboa to the National Transportation Terminal in Albrook, which effectively means that they have to pay fare on another bus or a taxi to get to jobs that used to require a single bus ride and a short walk.

Meanwhile students at the Instituto Nacional, which had been closed despite relatively mild protests there two days earlier, blocked the Avenida de los Martires until dislodged by riot police, then gradually retreated into their theoretically closed school, from the upper floors of which they threw desks and other objects at the cops below. Police responded with tear gas and rubber bullets, causing many residents of the adjoining neighborhood to flee their gassed-out apartments. In the fighting 13 students and the school's disciplinary inspector were arrested, but before the police stormed the building a truce was arranged by which the students were allowed to evacuate the school in a bus without being arrested.

Later, near the Instituto Nacional, masked students did battle. Photo by G. Vega

Over the next two days several other high schools erupted in violent protests and SUNTRACS conducted a series of brief surprise street blockades at points around the city. The main confrontations on the May 3 and 4 were on Calle 50, Via Israel in Paitilla, Avenida Balboa and Via España in Perejil. Television viewers were treated to scenes of dozens of high school kids being led away by police with their hands in the air — 159 were arrested, booked at the juvenile court, and turned over to their parents. The continuing confrontations led the Education Ministry to close all public high schools in Panama City and San Miguelito.

Over the weekend passions subsided a bit, but talks between the government and protesting labor unions were fruitless. Sporadic minor street blockages continued the following Monday and Tuesday, but violence flared anew on May 9, after a peaceful protest march by labor and student groups to the Palacio de las Garzas. Once at the presidential palace a small group — Government and Justice Minister Winston Spadafora alleged that they were "foreign elements," without identifying the culprits or their nationality — attempted to break through the police barricades. The cops replied with tear gas, sparking running street battles through the Casco Viejo, the Avenida Central pedestrian mall, El Chorrillo and Calidonia. When maleantes unconnected with the protests took advantage of the situation to loot businesses on Avenida Central, police and some shopkeepers opened fire with live ammunition, and by the end of the day 15 people were treated at hospitals for gunshot wounds and dozens of people were under arrest.

The main weapons employed by either side on display. Photo by G. Vega

 

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